








































COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 














© Underwood and Underwood 

ADMIRAL ROBERT E. PEARY, DISCOVERER OF THE 

NORTH POLE 












Heroes of the Farthest North 
and Farthest South 


By 

J. KENNEDY MACLEAN 

N \ 


Revised and Enlarged 
By 

J. Walker McSpadden 


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ILLUSTRATED 


NEW YORK 

THOMAS Y. CROWELL COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 





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Copyright 1923 

By Thomas Y. Crowell Company 



Printed in the United States of America 


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©C1A70435S 

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PREFACE 


The present revision of Mr. Maclean’s stir¬ 
ring story adds nearly a third more of mate¬ 
rial—a portion to the earlier chapters, and the 
bulk at the end. We have tried to include in 
the covers of a single volume a complete pic¬ 
ture of polar conquest. We begin at the begin¬ 
ning, “The Men Who First Sought the Pole,” 
away back in the days of the Norsemen. Then 
came the search for the Northwest Passage, 
which was so closely linked with the early ex¬ 
ploration and development of our own country. 
We remember that Hudson sailed up the river 
which bears his name, believing he was entering 
that trade route to the Indies. John and Se¬ 
bastian Cabot coasted along the shores of New¬ 
foundland, on the same quest. Even Colum¬ 
bus, still earlier, was sailing for the Indies when 
he sighted America. Frobisher, Davis, Scoresby, 
Franklin, Parry and other intrepid voyagers 
came next; and upon each expedition the frozen 
North yielded up a few more of its jealously 
guarded secrets. Then came Kane, Greely, and 
a score of American explorers. Nansen, of 

(v) 


VI 


PREFACE 


Norway, set a new high mark, but was followed 
by our own Peary and the conquest of the 
North Pole itself. 

This great victory still further stimulated in¬ 
terest in the Southern region, culminating in 
the magnificent dashes of Shackleton, Scott and 
Amundsen, leaving the flags or Norway and 
Britain floating side by side at the South Pole. 

Still more recent voyages have been under¬ 
taken, both north and south, which are described 
in the final chapter. A chronology follows, giv¬ 
ing a concise survey in point of time of these 
voyages and explorations. But no summary or 
survey can apprise the reader of the hardships, 
daring, and almost superhuman endurance which 
have made such a story possible. It stands 
almost without a parallel in human annals. 

J. W. M. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTEB PAGE 

I. The Men Who First Sought the Pole . . 1 

II. The Search for the Northwest Passage . S 

III. The Fate of Henry Hudson.19 

IV. A Land Expedition.28 

V. The First Use of Sledges.34 

VI. Franklin and His Travels.43 

VII. The Tragic Fate of Franklin.62 

VIII. How Dr. Kane Escaped from an Icy Prison 71 

IX. Further Adventures of American Explorers 88 

X. The “Jeannette” Expedition.110 

XI. Greely Sets a New Northern Mark . . . 124 

XII. The Northeast Passage Discovered . . . 142 

XIII. Nansen at the “Farthest North” .... 152 

XIV. The Northwest Passage Navigated at Last . 171 

XV. Peary’s Twenty Years of Arctic Struggle . 181 

XVI. The North Pole Conquered.192 

XVII. The Lure of the South Pole.202 

XVIII. The Voyage of the “Scotia”.213 

XIX. Captain Scott’s Expedition in the “Discovery” 218 

XX. Shackheton’s Farthest South.238 

XXI. The Great Race to the Goal.257 

XXII. Recent Voyages.274 

Chronology . 291 

Index ............. 293 

(vli) 















ILLUSTRATIONS 


Admiral Robert E. Peary 


Frontis 


Discoverer of the North Pole 


Page 


Map of North Polar Regions . 

Sir John Franklin . 

North Bay where Sir John Franklin’s Expedition per¬ 


ished from scurvy and starvation . 69 

“Goodbye, Polaris” . 103 

“Signalled her to go on” . 119 


“Sitting in his shirt sleeves, he held his friend in his arms” 139 
An Arctic explorer coming out of his igloo where he spent 

the winter. 146 

“With difficulty he pulled himself on hoard” . 168 

“The black avalanche of thundering beasts was bearing 

down on their enemies” . 191 


The Roosevelt, Peary’s ship, under steam blowing a 

farewell at Etah . 

Map of South Polar Regions . 

Ice Pressure in the Weddell Sea . 

Captain R. F. Scott, R. N. 

Sir Earnest Shackleton . 

The Frairt and members of the Amundsen Expedition on 

skiis . 

Lieut. Hansen of the Admunsen Expedition standing at the 

South Pole .. 

The Quest on which Shackleton died. 


193 

202 

213 

218 

238 


262 

264 

274 


(viii) 



















Heroes of Farthest North 
and F arthest South 

i 

THE MEN WHO FIRST SOUGHT 

THE POLE 

T HE story of North Pole adventure dates 
back over a thousand years. Long before 
Columbus had sailed his three tiny vessels 
across the Atlantic to find a new world, adven¬ 
turers were thinking and talking and planning 
of a way to reach the extreme north. 

Our first historical record of such adventure 
dates back to the early days of English history 
when good King Alfred sat upon the throne. 

Residing at the court of Alfred, about the 
year 890 , was a Norwegian named Othar, who, 
"feeling, as he himself said, “a desire to learn 
how far the land stretched towards the north, 
and if there were any regions inhabited by man 
northward beyond the desert waste, sailed 
away on a voyage of geographical discovery, 
and on his return made a report of his enter¬ 
prise to the king, who placed on record the re¬ 
el) 


2 MEN WHO SOUGHT THE POLE 

suits of the voyage. Thus, while Othar the 
Norwegian was the first to enter the Arctic sea. 
King Alfred of England was the earliest chron- 

icier of Arctic adventure. 

It is possible that Othar’s example was 
followed by other daring Northmen, for the 
spirit of adventure was in their blood, and they 
loved the wild life of the rover; but almost a 
century elapsed before seafarers turned their 
prows northward again, or the curtain was again 
lifted in the Polar sea. 

A certain bold Icelandic rover, Eric the Red, 
had been convicted of manslaughter, and sen¬ 
tenced to banishment for a term of years. Re¬ 
solving to employ his enforced absence from his 
fatherland in exploration, he “prepared a vessel 
and sailing with his followers in a westerly 
course, he came in sight of the east coast of 
Greenland, along which he steered southwards, 
looking for a habitable spot. Having spent 
three years in exploring the western coasts of 
Greenland, he returned to Iceland, and made so 
favorable a report of the new country that, in 
985 or 986, he induced a large body of colonists 
to sail with him from Iceland in twenty-five 
ships. Half of the ill-fated fleet perished in the 
ice; but the remnant reached their destination, 
and a few years later all the habitable places of 
Greenland were occupied.” 



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MAP OF NORTH POLAR REGIONS 

























































MEN WHO SOUGHT THE POLE 3 


For the next five centuries little seems to have 
been done towards wresting the secrets of the 
Arctic; until the century that knew Columbus 
was ushered in. Then a spirit of restlessness 
and desire to know more about the world was 
shown in many lands. 

In 1491 there came to the court of Henry 
VII., of England, a Venetian named Giovanni 
Cabot, better known in England as John Cabot. 
His object was to enlist the support of the king 
on behalf of his seafaring enterprises, as he 
already failed in a similar mission at the 
courts of Spain and Portugal. His appeal to 
England’s king was not in vain. Henry, who 
had been disappointed in his efforts to secure the 
services of Columbus, granted, in 1496, letters- 
patent to John Cabot and his three sons to take 
possession, on behalf of England, of any un¬ 
known country that they might discover. 

In their frail vessel, the Matthew, the adven¬ 
turous John Cabot and his son Sebastian sailed 
from Bristol in 1497, and in June of the same 
year came within sight of what is supposed to 
have been Newfoundland; though some author¬ 
ities are of opinion that it was the coast of Lab¬ 
rador which was discovered. Along this coast 
they sailed for about nine hundred miles. 
Landing, they could discover no people; and 
there they planted on the soil the banners of 


4 MEN WHO SOUGHT THE POLE 


England and of Venice. Returning to Eng¬ 
land, they poured into the ears of the delighted 
king the story of their success, and prepara¬ 
tions were immediately begun for a second voy¬ 
age across the Atlantic. In 1498, Henry granted 
to Cabot special authority to obtain ships and 
volunteers, and an expedition, consisting of a 
fleet of five ships, sailed from Bristol, but never 
returned; and of its fate nothing was ever 
heard. 

The Portuguese began to be active on their 
own account at the same time. Their first ex¬ 
pedition, sailing under Gaspar Corte-Real, in 
1500, reached the coast of Greenland. A more 
ambitious voyage the following year extended 
westward across the Atlantic to the shores of 
the North American continent near Greenland. 
Like Cabot’s second adventure, that of Corte- 
Real resulted in his death. Only one of his 
ships returned to Lisbon, and his brother who 
went in search of him the following year was 
never heard from again. These expeditions, 
however, had one substantial value. Reports of 
the great new fishing-grounds of the North At¬ 
lantic Coast, which they brought home, resulted 
in a fleet of fishermen from England, Portugal, 
and the Basque and Breton provinces coming 
out to these waters. Some of these are believed 


MEN WHO SOUGHT THE POLE 5 


to have gone northward as far as Hudson 
Bay, but they were fishermen, not discoverers, 
and have left no record of exploration. 

The idea of a passage to India by way of the 
North Pole was suggested by Robert Thorne, 
a merchant of Bristol, in 1527. When the plan 
was placed before Henry VIII., of England, 
he was quick to act upon it, despatching in 
May of that year “two fair ships well manned 
and victualed, having in them divers cunning 
men to seek strange regions.” This expedi¬ 
tion, consisting of two ships, the Mary of 
Guildford and the Sampson , was without any 
practical result. The Sampson, it appears, was 
lost in a storm; while the other vessel, though 
she touched at Newfoundland, added nothing 
to our knowledge of that country, and returned 
to England about five months after her de¬ 
parture. A few years later another expedition 
was sent, which consisted of three vessels under 
the command of Sir Hugh Willoughby in the 
Bona Esperanza, a vessel of 120 tons, carrying 
thirty-five men. The other ships were the Ed¬ 
ward Bonadventure, 160 tons, carrying fifty 
men, and commanded by Richard Chancellor 
and Stephen Burrough, and the Bona Confi - 
dentia, with twenty-eight men. Towards the 
middle of July the coast of Norway was 
sighted, and all went well for the next two 


6 MEN WHO SOUGHT THE POLE 


months. Then, about the middle of September, 
a furious storm drove the ships apart off the 
Lofoten Islands, the Edward Bonadventure 
parting company with the other two ships, 
which ultimately found a refuge for the time 
being in a deadlocked harbor on the coast of 
Russian Lapland. 

Their perils, however, were by no means at 
an end. The winter was setting in with sever¬ 
ity, and it was not long before Willoughby and 
his men were suffering the most acute hard¬ 
ships. Death at last came to release them from 
their sufferings, the commander and the sixty- 
two men who accompanied him all perishing. 
The ships, with the bodies of the crews, were 
found in the following year by a party of Rus¬ 
sian fishermen. 

The third vessel of the expedition, the Ed¬ 
ward Bonadventure, commanded by Chancel¬ 
lor, fared better. After the storm which had 
separated her from the other ships had passed, 
Chancellor stood by in the hope of the compan¬ 
ion ships making their appearance. But when, 
after a stay of seven days, there were no signs 
of the missing ships, the Bonadventure pushed 
on, sailing to Archangel, on the White Sea. 
Hearing of the arrival of the Englishmen, the 
Czar invited them to his court at Moscow, 
where they were treated with every hospitality, 


MEN WHO SOUGHT THE POLE 7 


and where a treaty was concluded giving free¬ 
dom to trade to English ships. 

It was not long before this hardy seaman was 
again absent from England on a northern 
expedition. With a commission from Queen 
Mary for the opening up of commercial rela¬ 
tions with Russia, Chancellor sailed from Eng¬ 
land on a voyage of adventure. He reached 
Novaya Zemlya, which had been sighted by 
Willoughby three years earlier, and made the 
discovery of the Kara Strait. He arrived at 
Archangel in safety, but on his homeward voy¬ 
age the Bonadventure was wrecked, and Chan¬ 
cellor and most of his crew perished. 


II 


THE SEARCH FOR THE NORTH¬ 
WEST PASSAGE 

W HEN Columbus set sail westward, his 
real object was to find a new route to 
India; and so firmly was this idea 
lodged in his mind that the natives of the land 
which he discovered were called “Indians,” be¬ 
cause they were believed to be inhabitants of 

that country. 

Later still, when the Pacific Ocean was 
sighted, on the other side of the new continent, 
seamen became all the more eager to leach In¬ 
dia and China. The southern routes, east by 
the Cape of Good Hope, and west by Cape 
Horn, were long and perilous. The prize 
which they now sought was a Northwest Pas¬ 
sage. We find the old records of that day teem¬ 
ing with allusions to this route. 

One of the foremost navigators to attempt 
the Northwest Passage was Martin Frobisher. 
“Being persuaded of a new and nearer passage 
to Cataya” (China) he “determined and re¬ 
solved with himself, to go make full proof 
thereof, or else never to return again, knowing 
this to be the only thing of the world that was 

(8) 


THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE 9 


yet left undone, whereby a notable mind might 
be made famous and fortunate.” For fifteen 
years he vainly sought funds for the support 
of his enterprise. At last the Earl of Warwick 
was aroused, and he in turn appealed to Queen 
Elizabeth. The appeal needed to go no far¬ 
ther. The great queen interested herself 
promptly in anything that promised to enhance 
the glory of her reign—and at her instance the 
Muscovy Company issued a patent to Fro¬ 
bisher, and the merchants of London found the 
money for the enterprise. 

Frobisher finally set sail with three small ves¬ 
sels and a total crew of thirty-five men. The 
smallest of the fleet, a pinnace of ten tons, was 
lost. After more than a month of sailing, land 
was sighted but could not be approached on ac¬ 
count of ice. It was the eastern coast of 
Greenland, but Frobisher mistook it for Fin¬ 
land, of which a fictitious account had been pub¬ 
lished, which had reached England. Here the 
Michael Frobisher’s second ship, left him se¬ 
cretly, fearing to fare further on account of the 
vast ice pack, “and returned home with great re¬ 
port that he w r as cast away.” The fearless Fro¬ 
bisher continued to sail due northwest in the 
Gabriel alone, although his ship had become al¬ 
most dismasted by the gales. 

He next sighted a bold headland which he 


10 THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE 


named for his patron, Queen Elizabeths Fore¬ 
land. This was afterwards identified as the 
southern coast of Baffin Land, latitude 62 N. 
Here the ice barrier was again defiant, but he 
worked his way through finally, and reaching 
the coast found an inlet which he took to be the 
strait leading to the Northwest Passage, and in 
commemoration of his supposed triumph he 
gave it his own name. In the maps to-day and 
for all time it stands as Frobisher Bay. The 
intrepid voyager’s provisions were by this time 
exhausted. A further exploration of the inlet 
resulted in the loss of the ship’s boat and five 
men of his preciously small crew. 

Frobisher returned home, only to find that fur¬ 
ther adventure awaited him. Some specimens of 
a dark, heavy stone which he brought back among 
his other trophies were eagerly seized on by 
speculative minds as containing gold ore. A 
gold-fever spread in London and for the mo¬ 
ment all thoughts of the Northwest Passage 
were cast aside. Much larger expeditions than 
Frobisher’s original one were sent out for each 
of the two years following. The third expedi¬ 
tion, in 1578, consisted of fifteen vessels, carry¬ 
ing one hundred colonists to settle the new El¬ 
dorado. But the dream was never fulfilled. 
Leading the expedition, Frobisher reached 
Hudson Strait which he mistook for the inlet he 


THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE 11 


had first discovered. That he was all wrong in 
his reckoning he soon found out. However, be¬ 
ing as hardy a mariner as ever sailed these diffi¬ 
cult seas, he kept on his course and came to an 
open sea westward—which looked so propitious 
that his soul was again heartened. There was 
no land—even no ice—and again the vision of 
the Orient arose to tempt him. This was the 
open way at last to the great “Mare del Sur 
(Pacific Ocean) and “Cataya” (China). He 
was sorely tempted to cast loose and try his 
fate, but he was an Englishman and his first 
duty was to his employers. He must seek the 
“gold-lands,” which he at last found and his ves¬ 
sels came home, loaded with ore which proved 
comparatively worthless, and the colonization 

scheme was abandoned. 

George Best was one of Frobisher’s lieuten¬ 
ants who seems to have been very much in his 
confidence. He accompanied him on all three 
voyages and wrote a short account of them as 
they are presented by the Hakluyt Society. 
They give in lively style the very color and 
temper of the adventure by sea of that period, 
and we cannot possibly do better by our readers 
than to quote from them. Writing of the sec¬ 
ond voyage, Best records, “After we had pro¬ 
vided us here (the Orkney Islands) of further 
matter sufficient for our voyage, the 8th of 




12 THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE 


June we set sail again, and passing through 
Saint Mangus’s Sound, having a merry wind by 
night, came clear and lost sight of all the land, 
and keeping our course west northwest by the 
space of two days, the wind shifted upon us, 
so that we lay in traverse on the seas with con¬ 
trary winds, making good as near as we could 
our course to the westward, and sometimes to 
the northward, as the wind shifted. And here¬ 
abouts we met with the sail of English fisher¬ 
men from Iceland, bound homeward, by whom 
we wrote our letters to our friends in England. 
We traversed these seas by the space of twenty- 
six days without sight of any land, and met 
with much drift-wood and whole bodies of trees. 
We saw many monstrous fishes and strange 
fowls which seemed to live only by the sea, be¬ 
ing there so far distant from any land. At 
length God favored us with more prosperous 
winds; and after we had sailed four days with 
good wind in the poop, the fourth of July, the 
Michael, being foremost ahead, shot off a piece 
of ordnance and struck all her sails, supposing 
that they descried land, which by reason of 
the thick mists, they could not make perfect. 
Howbeit, as well our account as also the great 
alteration of the water, which became more 
black and smooth, did plainly declare we were 
not far off the coast. 


THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE 13 


“Our General sent his master aboard the 
Michael —who had been with him the year be¬ 
fore—to bear in with the place to make proof 
thereof, who descried not the land perfect, but 
saw sundry huge islands of ice, which we 
deemed to be not past twelve leagues from the 
shore. About ten o’clock at night we made the 
land perfect, and knew it to be Friesland. And 
the height being taken here we found ourselves 
to be in the latitude of sixty degrees and a half, 
and were fallen with the southernmost part of 
this land.” 

As already stated, this was not Friesland. 
Rut whether they found the country they sup¬ 
posed or not, the account of their further ex¬ 
periences here is very entertaining reading. 

“This coast seemeth to have good fishing,” 
Rest continues, “for we, lying becalmed, let fall 
a hook without any bait, and presently caught 
a great fish called a halibut, which served the 
whole company for a day’s meat, and is danger¬ 
ous meat for surfeiting. And sounding about 
five leagues off from the shore our lead brought 
up in the tallow, a kind of coral, almost white, 
and small stones as bright as crystal: and it is 
not to be doubted that this land may be found 
very rich and beneficial if it were thoroughly 
discovered, although we saw no creature there 
but little birds. It is a marvelous thing to be- 


14 THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE 


hold what bigness and depth some islands of 
ice be here, some seventy, some eighty fathoms 
under water, besides that which is above, seem¬ 
ing islands more than half a mile in circuit. 

“We found none of these islands of ice salt 
in taste, whereby it appeareth that they were not 
congealed of the ocean sea-water which is al¬ 
ways salt, but of some standing or little-moving 
lakes, or great fresh waters near the shore, 
caused either by melted snows from the tops of 
mountains, or by continual access of fresh riv¬ 
ers from the land, and intermingling with the 
sea-water—bearing yet the dominion by the 
force of extreme frost may cause some part of 
salt water to freeze so with it, and so seem a 
little brackish; but otherwise the main sea freez- 
eth not, and therefore there is no Mare Gla - 
dale, or Frozen Sea, as the opinion hitherto 
hath been. 

“Our General proved [attempted] landing 
here twice, but by the sudden fall of mists to 
which this coast is much subject, he was like 
to lose sight of his ships; and being greatly en¬ 
dangered with the driving ice along the coast, 
was forced aboard and fain to surcease his pre¬ 
tence till a better opportunity might serve. 
And having spent four days and nights sailing 
along this and, finding the coast subject to 
such bitter cold and continual mists, he deter- 


THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE 15 


mined to spend no more time therein, but to 
bear out bis course towards the straits called 
Frobisher Straits after the General’s name, 
who being the first that ever passed beyond 
fifty-eight degrees to the northwards, for any¬ 
thing that hath been yet known of certainty, of 
Newfoundland, otherwise called the continent 
or firm land of America, discovered the said 

straits this last year 1576.” 

Having finally come into the region where 
the supposed gold ore which they had set out 
to gather existed, Best records: “Upon the 
18th of July our General, taking the gold with 
him attempted to go on shore with a small row- 
ing pinnace, upon the small island where the 
ore was taken up, to prove whether there was 
any store thereof to be found; but he could not 
get in all that island a piece so big as a walnut. 
But our men which sought the other islands 
thereabouts found them to have good store of 
the ore: whereupon our General with these good 
tidings returned aboard about ten o clock at 
night, and was joyfully welcomed of the com¬ 
pany with a volley of shot.” 

The next attempt to find the Northwest Pas¬ 
sage, was made by John Davis, who is character¬ 
ized “as one of the most scientific seamen of 
that age,” and after whom Davis Strait is 
named—which he devoutly believed to lead to 


16 THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE 

the true Northwest Passage. He made three 
voyages in three successive years under the pat¬ 
ronage of the London merchants, which were 
productive of much in the way of exploration. 
Sailing from Dartmouth with two ships, he 
sighted, “the most deformed, rocky and moun¬ 
tainous land that ever we saw.” He promptly 
called it on his charts the Land of Desolation, al¬ 
though he knew it was Greenland its eastern 
coast. Sailing for the west coast Davis an¬ 
chored in latitude 64° 10' near Gotthab, as the 
settlement made there by the Danes afterwards 
was called. Here he rested awhile and cultivated 
intimate relations with the Eskimos, who had 
been generally neglected, as of small account, 
by other explorers. He then crossed the water 
which now bears his name and coasted along the 
western shore till he came to Cumberland 
Sound, where he was obliged to turn back on 
account of shortness of supplies and contrary 
winds; hut he fully believed that he had at last 
found the right track. 

Davis started out again the following year, 
this time with four ships. The chief record of 
this voyage is that he traced the western shore 
of Davis Strait still further southward—and 
reached the coast of Labrador. 

On his third voyage in 1587, which he prob¬ 
ably realized would be his last unless he actually 


THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE 17 


found his way to China, he adventured boldly 
in a small pinnace far up the west coast of 
Greenland reaching 74° 42' North. Here he 
reports there was “no ice towards the north, 
but a great sea, free, large, and very salt and 
blue and of unsearchable depth.” He was 
prevented by contrary winds from exploring it, 
but sailing into Cumberland Sound found there 
was no passage that way, as a previous voyage 
had led him to hope. Sailing south he came to 
Labrador expecting to find the two larger ves¬ 
sels of his fleet awaiting him there, but they had 
already sailed. Here he struck a sunken rock 
which nearly wrecked his small craft, but he 
managed to get back across the ocean to Eng¬ 
land. He never wavered in his belief that in 
Davis Strait—as it was named in memory of 
his heroic efforts—he had found the way to the 
Northwest Passage, but he could get no support 
for another voyage. Davis Strait had, in fact, 
been long found out and was well-known to the 
Norsemen—but they were merely a race of sea- 
rovers, who with all their hardihood never pur¬ 
sued an adventure to a profitable conclusion for 
the rest of the world. 

The voyage of William Baffin, in 1616, was 
memorable. After a cruise full of hardship 
and peril, he succeeded in pushing further to 
the northwest than any of his predecessors. He 


18 THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE 


did not discover the Northwest Passage, but he 
did place upon the map that great landlocked 
body of water known as Baffin Bay. 

Before him, however, another bold adven¬ 
turer, Henry Hudson, had set sail for the west¬ 
ern seas. His tragic story deserves a chapter 
of its own. 


Ill 


THE FATE OF HENRY HUDSON 

H ENRY HUDSON, one of the bravest 
of English explorers, started on his first 
expedition to polar seas in 1607. He 
set sail on board the Hopeful, with only ten 
men and a boy for crew, to discover the North 
Pole, in hope that by sailing across the polar 
seas he might make his way to the “islands of 
spicery” (Japan). He was baffled in his effort 
by ice at the north of Spitzbergen; but his voy¬ 
age was not without its results, for his reports 
of the whales observed in these frozen seas 
brought about the beginnings of the great 
whale industry. 

Hudson sailed the next year, to seek a pass¬ 
age between Spitzbergen and Novaya Zembla, 
but, finding his way blocked, he was forced to 
return within a few months. In 1609 he sailed 
in search of the Northwest Passage, and in the 
course of his voyage discovered the noble river 
emptying into New York Bay, to which his 
name was given. His fourth enterprise proved 
to be his last. He was sent out, on board the 
Discovery , to continue his search for the North¬ 
west Passage. The accounts of this voyage, 

( 19 ) 



20 FATE OF HENRY HUDSON 


during which he entered the great bay that now 
bears his name, and explored some parts of the 
coast of Labrador, make one of the most tragic 
chapters in the whole history of exploration. 

When the Discovery was upon the eastern 
shores of Iceland, Hudson began to discover 
that, unfortunately, he had about him some dis¬ 
satisfied men. Juet, the mate, had been speak- 
ing lightly of the enterprise, discouraging the 
men, and trying to destroy their confidence in 
Hudson. He had been calling up their fears 
by telling them of dangers of the voyage; he 
even had urged two of the men “to keep their 
muskets charged and swords ready in their cab¬ 
ins, for there would be bloodshed before the 
voyage ended,” and talked boldly about turn¬ 
ing the head of the ship homeward. 

However, Hudson sailed from Iceland, and 
kept his course northwest for the American 
continent. As he passed across Davis Strait he 
continually met floating ice mountains that al¬ 
ways endangered, and sometimes obstructed, 
his progress. One of these overturned near the 
ship, and taught him to keep farther from 
them; but while struggling to avoid one he 
would meet another, and the farther he went 
they seemed to him to grow more “numerous 
and terryfying.” Still, by perserverance and 
skill he managed to reach a bay (supposed to 


FATE OF HENRY HUDSON 21 


be near the great strait that now bears his 
name), when a storm overtook him. The ice 
drove so rapidly against the ship that Hudson 
was forced, as his only chance of escape, to run 
her into the thickest of it, and there leave her. 

After the storm ceased, they set to work to 
release themselves from the ice. Yet the more 
they labored the worse their situation became, 
until at last they could proceed no farther. 
Hudson’s heart sickened, for as he cast his eyes 
again and again upon the desolate scene there 
seemed no possibility of escape. His courage 
kept up, though he afterwards confessed to one 
of the men that he feared he would never es¬ 
cape, but was doomed to perish there in the ice. 
His crew, however, saw no sign of fear in him, 
for he carried a cheerful countenance, while 
they were dismayed and broken-spirited. 

Calling the crew to his cabin he showed them 
by his charts that they had passed three hun¬ 
dred miles farther than any had been before, 
and gave them their choice, whether they would 
proceed or turn back. The men could come to 
no decision; some were for proceeding, some 
for returning. The great majority of them did 
not care where they went, provided they were 
clear of the ice. 

Hudson already knew that he had a mutin¬ 
ous set of men, and that they themselves scarce- 


22 FATE OF HENRY HUDSON 


ly knew what they desired, but this was no time 
to resent their words and punish them. His 
object was to pacify them. He, therefore, rea¬ 
soned with them, trying to allay their fears, 
rouse their hopes, and inspire them with cour¬ 
age, until at length they all again set reso¬ 
lutely to work to bring the ship from the ice 
and save themselves. After much labor they 
succeeded in turning her round. They worked 
their way little by little, until at length they 
found themselves in a clear sea, and kept on 
their course northwest. 

Hoping that the long-sought passage was 
clear before him, Hudson sent a number of 
men on shore at the point of land he had named 
Cape Digges, in honor of one of the members 
of the company which had employed him. He 
instructed them to climb the hills that they 
might see the great ocean beyond the strait, but 
a thunderstorm prevented them from complet¬ 
ing their exploration. 

With some difficulty they returned to the ship, 
for a fog had risen upon the water, and Hud¬ 
son found it necessary to fire two guns that 
they might know where he was. They told of 
what supplies they had found, and when the 
storm was over tried to persuade the master to 
remain here a day or two while they went 
ashore again and provisioned the ship. But 


FATE OF HENRY HUDSON 23 


Hudson would listen to no such request. He 
could suffer no delay, for he felt almost certain 
that his way was clear before him, and burned 
to press onward. Again he sent some of the 
men ashore, to see if they could make out the 
ocean beyond. They returned, reporting that 
the sea was open to the south. Pressing on, he 
entered the sea, and, continuing his course 
south, was erelong at the southern extremity 
of it. It proved to be only a part of the great 
inland sea—Hudson Bay—upon which he was 
voyaging; and, disappointed to find that he 
could proceed no farther in this direction, with 
a sad heart he prepared to retrace his course 
northward. 

It was September before Hudson moved 
north again, and he spent the whole of this and 
the next month in exploring the great bay, still 
longing for his western passage. Early in No¬ 
vember they began to search for a proper place 
where they might shelter themselves for the 
winter. In a little time they found what they 
thought a suitable position; the ship was 
brought there, and hauled aground. By the 
10th they found themselves shut up for the sea¬ 
son; hard freezing weather had set in, and the 
ship was completely fastened in the ice. 

Two hardships were distinctly before them: 
the rigors of a northern winter, and a scanty 


24 FATE OF HENRY HUDSON 


supply of provisions; for the ship had been 
stored with provisions only for six months. 
Their only hope, therefore, was to take care of 
what they had, to get what they could in the 
neighborhood, and have patience till the spring, 
when they might reach Cape Digges, and then 
probably obtain supplies. Hudson prudently 
commenced at once putting the men on allow¬ 
ance, and then, to encourage them to industry 
in procuring other provisions, offered a reward 
to every man who should kill a “beast, fish, or 
fowl.” 

With the advance of winter they suffered se¬ 
verely from the cold, the men from time to time 
having their feet frozen and being thereby ren¬ 
dered lame. But in the way of provisions they 
fared for a while much better than they had ex¬ 
pected. For three months they found abund¬ 
ance of white partridges around them, and 
killed of these more than a hundred dozen. 
When spring came they were visited by other 
fowl, such as swans, geese, and ducks; but be¬ 
fore the ice broke up these too began to fail, 
and starvation now drove the voyagers to sad 
extremities. They went climbing over the hills 
and wandering through the valleys, in search of 
anything that might satisfy hunger. They ate 
the moss on the ground, and every frog that 
could he found. 


FATE OF HENRY HUDSON 25 


At last the ice broke up sufficiently to enable 
them to make up a fishing party and try their 
skill with the net. On the first day they were 
very successful. They caught five hundred 
fish, and began to think their sorrows at an end, 
so far as food was concerned, but they were 
doomed to disappointment, for on no day after 
did they take “a quarter of that number.” 

By this time two of the men were so dissatis¬ 
fied that they plotted to steal the boat, push off, 
and shift for themselves. But Hudson called 
for the boat himself, and their plot failed. He 
had perceived the woods on fire at the south 
for some time, and fancied that, if he could 
reach them, he might find some of the people 
and obtain provisions. Accordingly, he made 
ready the boat, took in eight or nine days’ pro¬ 
visions, and leaving orders that the crew should 
take in wood, water, and ballast, and have 
everything in readiness for his return, he de¬ 
parted. His voyage proved profitless; erelong 
he came back disappointed and tired, for 
though he could come near enough to see the 
people setting the woods on fire, he could never 

reach them. 

The men now prepared to depart from their 
cold winter quarters. Before he weighed an¬ 
chor, Hudson, with a sad heart, “distributed 
among the crew the remnant of provision,” 


26 FATE OF HENRY HUDSON 


about a pound of bread to each man, “and know¬ 
ing their wretched condition, and the uncer¬ 
tainty of what might befall, he also gave to 
every man a bill of return which might be 
showed at home, if it pleased God that they 
came home, and he wept when he gave it to 
them.” 

In early summer they hoisted sail. Unfor¬ 
tunately, in three or four days they found them¬ 
selves surrounded by ice and were forced to 
cast anchor. They were detained at their an¬ 
chorage amid the ice for nearly a week, and it 
was during this time that signs of mutiny be¬ 
gan again to appear among the crew. 

They finally decided to take Hudson and 
all the sick, place them in the boat, set it adrift, 
and then shift for themselves. In vain did one 
of the crew plead with them, pointing out the 
blackness of this intended crime. He reminded 
them also of their wives, their children, and 
their country, from which they would cut them¬ 
selves off forever by the deed; but all to no pur¬ 
pose, they were fully bent upon it. Despite his 
pleas, Hudson was seized and securely bound. 
The boat was hastily hauled alongside, the sick 
and lame were called up from their berths and or¬ 
dered to get in, and provisions for two days 
were put aboard. Hudson was then thrust into 
the boat, and his son John was thrown in after 


FATE OF HENRY HUDSON 27 


him. The anchor was weighed, the sails 
hoisted, and with a fair wind they stood east¬ 
ward, dragging the boat at the stern. When 
they had nearly cleared the ice, they cut the 
rope, and the boat was adrift, at the mercy of 
the ice and sea, till death, in what form no one 
knows, came to end the sufferings of the un¬ 
fortunate inmates. Nothing was ever learned 
of the fate of poor Hudson, one of the most in¬ 
trepid of the early voyagers. 


IV 


A LAND EXPEDITION 

HE disasters which followed one after 
another did not curb the ambitions of 



daring seamen who felt the call of the 
frozen North. In their frail and tiny vessels 
they 1 fearlessly looked death in the face, for 
they were of the stuff of which heroes are made. 
That they made such hazardous voyages in 
small barks fills us with surprise. The famous 
voyage of William Baffin, in 1616, in which the 
bay bearing his name was discovered, was per¬ 
formed in a vessel of only fifty-five tons burden; 
that of Hudson was made in the very same 
vessel; and the voyages of Davis were made 
chiefly in vessels of fifty tons or less. 

During the seventeenth and eighteenth cen¬ 
turies many attempts were made to find a North¬ 
west Passage, remarkable chiefly for their 
heroism. We know now that the open 
sea around the North Pole, so long and so per¬ 
sistently sought after, does not exist. But 
with our greater knowledge we do not forget 
the dauntless men who led the way into the 
desolate wastes of snow and ice, and as long 
as history continues to be written the memory 


(28) 


A LAND EXPEDITION 


29 


of their daring deeds will never die. We can¬ 
not turn from this record, however, without 
chronicling the story of Samuel Hearne, who 
tried to solve the riddle by going across coun¬ 
try on foot. A reward of twenty thousand 
pounds had been offered by the British Gov¬ 
ernment for the discovery of a route to the Pa¬ 
cific through Hudson Strait. Hearne, who 
must have been a great dreamer or he would 
never have attempted the feat, actually started, 
in 1771, to find the Passage on foot. 

Hearne was an English midshipman who 
came into America and entered the Hudson 
Bay Company’s service, and showed so much 
capacity, that at twenty-three he was sent on 
an exploring tour by water to the north of 
Hudson Bay. The mission was a success, and 
the following year he was sent on a bigger en¬ 
terprise—a great land voyage of discovery and 
exploration to the northwest, with the North¬ 
west Passage as its objective. His four com¬ 
panions dragged a single sledge full of sup¬ 
plies. There is no record that they used dogs. 
Starting from Fort Churchill on Hudson Bay 
they blazed a trail across the treeless waste 
now called Mackenzie which skirts the Arctic 
Circle. In summer this land bears a thin coat¬ 
ing of grass, and in winter, which is nine months 
long, it is covered with unending snow. The 



30 


A LAND EXPEDITION 


only inhabitants were stray groups of Eskimos 
and a few Indians. Occasional herds of cari¬ 
bou were Hearne’s chief dependence for food, 
as indeed they are of all travellers through the 
Arctic wastes. His chief danger lay not so 
much in starvation as a violent death at the 
hands of either Indians or Eskimos, who were 
at that time in perpetual warfare. He did not 
dare to hire a guide from either side. 

Starting in the late spring with the first 
signs of breaking weather, the party had 
reached Lake Dubawnt, two degrees below the 
Arctic Circle, by the end of summer. During 
the first night’s camp here the snow fell four 
inches, and the next morning the pair who had 
kept watch were found frozen stiff, and only 
restored after long labors. A blinding snow¬ 
fall continued during the day in which the travel¬ 
lers kept on, believing they must be near the 
first objective, the mouth of the Coppermine 
River, which was in fact still six hundred miles 
away. They had brought no tent, having set¬ 
tled on camping in the open, a decision which 
they bitterly regretted the first night after the 
early and unexpected storm broke. It con¬ 
tinued that night and they were obliged to sleep 
under the sledges as a sort of lean-to, first hav¬ 
ing cleared a patch of ground underneath of 
snow. In the morning, confronted by a sea of 


A LAND EXPEDITION 


31 


boundless white, Hearne’s companions lost 
their heads and insisted on a return, and their 
leader at last consented to guide them back. 
They retreated to Fort Prince of Wales, one 
of the company’s posts, where they spent the 
winter, and with the first signs of open weather, 
Hearne was off again. By July, he had 
reached the 65th parallel. A little later as the 
short summer waned, his followers again lost 
heart and turned on him. Hearne adminis¬ 
tered a lesson in the shape of a good thrashing 
to the leader, and on awaking the next day 
found his arms, his sledge and his men all gone. 
He started after them but their tracks were 
soon lost in a fresh snowfall. They had left 
him with two days’ provisions, and he kept on 
till he reached a friendly Indian camp which 
he found deserted. He was now alone in a 
trackless waste without arms or provisions, ex¬ 
posed to any danger that could be conceived. 
He had his compass, and with this and his 
knowledge of sea navigation, he stumbled on 
for days in the direction of Fort Prince of 
Wales. In his own account he states that he 
“fasted whole days and nights, twice upwards 
of three days, once near seven days, tasting 
nothing the while but a few cranberries, water, 
melted snow or ice, scraps of leather and burnt 
bones.” When he reached the Fort he was a 


32 


A LAND EXPEDITION 


skeleton, hardly able to stand. But his first 
declaration was, “I shall go back next year, if 
I die by the way”. 

The next spring he started forth from the 
gates of the fort alone—and by the end of Au¬ 
gust had got as far as the camp where his fol¬ 
lowers had deserted him. Near here he met 
friendly Indians who not only supplied him 
with food in the shape of caribou meat and 
moss, but were willing to guide him to the Cop¬ 
permine which he finally reached, and in less 
than a week thereafter he stood, as he believed, 
on the shore of the Arctic Ocean. No land save 
the coast on the northeast side of the gulf was 
visible. On the snow were scattered the bones 
of seals and whales. There could be but one 
conclusion, Hearne told himself, He had at 
last discovered the “Hyperborean Sea”—far¬ 
thest limit of the north of America; and all his 
troubles and hardships, and his thirteen-hun¬ 
dred mile walk seemed as nothing. Hearne 
turned back from this point reaching Fort 
Prince of Wales after four years altogether in 
the Arctic wastes. 

The great pathfinder, Mackenzie, showed later 
that Hearne had only reached Coronation Gulf, 
as it is now called, and was yet four hundred 
miles from the Arctic Ocean. But his name 
will live as one of the earliest and most intrepid 



A LAND EXPEDITION 


33 


of the Hudson Bay Company’s explorers, and 
the first man who set forth with the great vision 
of trying to discover the Northwest Passage by 
land. 


V 


THE FIRST USE OF SLEDGES 

T HE early years of the nineteenth cen¬ 
tury witnessed a great revival of inter¬ 
est in Polar research. Much of the 
awakened interest in the search for the North¬ 
west Passage was due to Captain Scoresby, the 
able and scientific master of a whaling-ship. 
His published account of the Greenland seas 
drew the attention of all Europe to that quar¬ 
ter, and the British Government was roused to 
undertake a new series of enterprises. Four 
stout vessels were selected, and were strength¬ 
ened to resist the shocks and pressure of the ice 
in a manner which had never before been at¬ 
tempted. 

Two of these, the Dorothea, commanded by 
Captain David Buchan, and the Trent, under 
Lieutenant John Franklin, sailed in 1818, with 
instructions to proceed northward by way of 
Spitzbergen, and to endeavor to cross the Polar 
Sea. The other two, the Isabella, under the 
command of Captain John Boss, and the Alex¬ 
ander , commanded by William Edward Parry, 
were appointed to perform their voyage of dis¬ 
covery through Davis Strait. Ross and Parry, 

( 34 ) 



SIR JOHN FRANKLIN 

















































' 







FIRST USE OF SLEDGES 


35 


as a result of these explorations, were able to 
confirm the accuracy of the observations made 
two hundred years before by Baffin. 

Parry sailed once more in 1821, with the 
Fury and the Hecla, under instructions to pro¬ 
ceed westward through Hudson Strait. He 
reached Hudson Strait in the following July, 
and anchored in Repulse Bay, from which no 
passage to the west could be found. Under 
these circumstances it was decided to winter 
near Lyon’s Inlet, and there the ships remained 
till July of the following year. 

After encountering many dangers, the ex¬ 
pedition arrived at a strait to which Parry gave 
the name of the Fury and Hecla, and which he 
believed to be an opening into the Polar Sea. 
Winter again found the vessels in these frigid 
quarters, and for a second time the expedition 
was frozen up. When summer came the ex¬ 
plorers were able to find a passage out, and 
reached England towards the end of 1823. 

Still obeying the call of the North, Parry 
once again set out in 1824, with the same ships. 
This time he was less fortunate. In a great 
storm the Fury was abandoned, and only the 
Hecla returned to England. 

These expeditions demonstrated beyond all 
doubt that the dream of sailing direct to the 
North Pole must be forever given up, as the 


36 FIRST USE OF SLEDGES 


sea, blocked with eternal ice, offered no pass¬ 
age that led to the desired goal. After a cer¬ 
tain point had been reached by water, farther 
progress over the ice must be made by means of 
sledges. 

Convinced of the possibility of such a plan. 
Parry put it into execution in 1827, inaugurat¬ 
ing, by so doing, a new era in Arctic explora¬ 
tion. Sailing to Spitzbergen in the Hecla, 
Parry started from the north end of the group 
with two flat-bottomed boats on runners to be¬ 
gin his journey to the Pole. Each boat carried 
fourteen men, and in crossing the ice the com¬ 
mander preferred to travel by night rather than 
by day. 

After sailing over the water for two hundred 
miles, the boats were dragged over ice-floes for 
nearly one hundred miles, a feat that involved 
considerable hardship, for the ice was rough. 
Undaunted by these difficulties, however, the 
expedition pushed ahead, attaining at last 82° 
40' 30" of northern latitude, the highest point 
hitherto reached by man, and one which, for a 
long time to come, was to remain the “farthest 
north.” 

Parry would have gone still farther, had it 
not been “that the current which set continu¬ 
ously to the south carried back the boats during 
the hours allotted to the repose of the crews; 


FIRST USE OF SLEDGES 


37 


thus the daily advance, notwithstanding great 
exertion, was consequently small.” 

His journal gives us a graphic account of 
the daily life of the crew. Parry, like others of 
these hardy voyagers, was noted for his piety: 
“When we rose in the evening we commenced 
our day by prayers, after which we took off our 
fur sleeping-dresses, and put on those for trav¬ 
elling; the former being made of camlet lined 
with raccoon-skin, and the latter of strong 
blue box-cloth. We made a point of always 
putting on the same stockings or boots for trav¬ 
elling in, whether they had dried during the day 
or not; and I believe it was only in five or six 
instances at the most that they were not either 
still wet, or hard frozen. This indeed was of no 
consequence beyond the discomfort of first put¬ 
ting them on, as they were thoroughly wet in 
a quarter of an hour. On the other hand, it 
was of vital importance to keep dry things for 
sleeping in. Being ‘rigged’ for travelling we 
breakfasted upon warm cocoa and biscuit, and 
after throwing the things in the boats and on 
the sledges we set off on our day’s journey and 
usually travelled from five to five and a half 
hours, then stopped an hour to dine, and again 
travelled forth, five even six hours according to- 
circumstances.” 

This, be it remembered, was the first journey 


38 FIRST USE OF SLEDGES 


in the effort to reach the Pole over the ice by 
men and sledges. Parry was the pioneer in the 
only practical way, as Peary (whose name is 
so akin to his) afterwards proved. 

“After this,’’ he continues, “we halted for the 
night, as we called it, though it was usually 
early in the morning, selecting the largest sur¬ 
face of ice we happened to be near for hauling 
the boats on to, in order to prevent as far as 
possible the danger of its breaking up, and also 
to prevent drift. The boats were placed close 
alongside each other with their sterns to the 
wind, the snow or water cleared out of them, 
and the sails supported by the bamboo masts 
and three paddles placed over them as awnings, 
an entrance being left at the bow. Every man 
then immediately put on dry stockings and fur 
boots, after which we set about any necessary 
repairs of any sort. Most of the officers and 
men then smoked their pipes, which served to 
dry the boats and awnings very much, and usu¬ 
ally raised the temperatures of our lodgings 
ten to fifteen degrees. This part of the twenty- 
four hours was often a time, and the only one, 
of real enjoyment to us. The men told their 
stories and fought all their battles o’er again, 
and the labors of the day, unsuccessful as they 
too often were, were forgotten. A regular 
watch was set during our resting-time to look 


FIRST USE OF SLEDGES 


39 


out for bears, or for the ice breaking up round 
us, as well as to attend to the drying of the 
clothes, each man alternately taking the duty 
for one hour. We then concluded our day with 
prayers, and having put on our fur dresses lay 
down to sleep with a degree of comfort which 
perhaps few persons would imagine possible 
under such circumstances. Our chief inconven¬ 
ience was that we were somewhat pinched for 
room and therefore obliged to stow rather closer 
than was altogether agreeable. The tempera¬ 
ture while we slept was usually from thirty-six 
to forty-five degrees according to the state of 
the external atmosphere. After we had slept 
seven hours, the men appointed to boil the cocoa 
roused us, when it was ready, by the sound of a 
bugle, when our day began again.” 

It may help us to understand better the cour¬ 
age and fortitude involved in these explora¬ 
tions, if we glance at some of the remarkable 
effects of cold, as related in the journals of 

other Polar navigators. 

Captain Scoresby, in his story of the Arctic 
regions, tells us that when wintering in Hudson 
Bay, Captain James experienced such cold that 
many of the sailors had their noses, cheeks, and 
fingers frozen as white as paper. 

Ellis, who wintered in the same region, found 
bottled beer, though wrapped in tow and placed 


40 FIRST USE OF SLEDGES 


near a constant fire, frozen solid. Many of the 
sailors had their faces, ears, and toes frozen; 
glasses used in drinking stuck to their mouths, 
and sometimes removed the skin from the lips 
or tongue. 

Sir John Franklin tells us that one evening 
“we found the mercury of our thermometer had 
sunk into the bulb and was frozen. It rose 
again into the tube on being held to the fire, but 
quickly redescended into the bulb on being re¬ 
moved into the air. We could not, therefore, 
ascertain by it the temperature of the atmos¬ 
phere, either then or during our journey.” A 
still more astonishing example of the effect of 
the cold is given by him. Fish that had been 
frozen alive recovered their animation when 
thawed before the fire; and mention is made of 
a carp which “recovered so far as to leap about 
with much vigor, after it had been frozen for 
three hours.” 

Other peculiarities of these regions may be 
noted in passing. Scurvy was a very alarming 
disease, and many explorers perished by it. 
Sudden storms had also to be guarded against. 
Captain Scoresby tells us that on one occasion 
his father, while navigating the Greenland Sea, 
landed on the coast. The day being particu¬ 
larly fine, he ascended a considerable elevation, 
the summit of which was not broader than a 


FIRST USE OF SLEDGES 


41 


common table, and which on one side was as 
steep as the roof of a house, and on the other 
formed a precipice. Engaged in admiring the 
extensive prospect, he scarcely noticed the ad¬ 
vance of a very small cloud. Its rapid approach 
at length excited his attention. When it 
reached the place where he was seated, a torrent 
of wind assailed him with such violence that he 
was obliged to throw himself on his body, and 
stick his hands and feet into the snow, to pre¬ 
vent himself from being hurled over the tremen¬ 
dous slope which threatened his instant destruc¬ 
tion. The cloud having passed, the air, to his 
great satisfaction, became calm, when he im¬ 
mediately descended by sliding down the sur¬ 
face of snow, and in a few minutes reached the 
base of the mountain in safety. 

The temperature during the open months is 
subject to violent changes. Hood records that 
on the 15th of March the thermometer fell in 
the open air to fifteen degrees below zero, and 
rose on the following day to sixty above. It 
was first observed on this expedition that frogs, 
fish and even insects as small as mosquitoes 
frozen lifeless would revive on being submitted 
to heat. Hood gives a vivid account of the mos¬ 
quitoes, that pest of the explorer in all climes: 
“We had sometimes before procured a little 
rest by closing the tent and burning wood or 


42 FIRST USE OF SLEDGES 


flashing gunpowder within, the smoke driving 
the mosquitoes into the crannies of the ground. 
But this remedy was now ineffectual, though 
we employed it so perseveringly as to hazard 
suffocation; they swarmed under our blankets, 
goring us with their envenomed trunks and 
steeping our clothes in blood. We rose at day¬ 
light in a fever, and our misery was unmitigated 
during our whole stay. 

“The food of a mosquito is blood, which it can 
extract by penetrating the hide of a buffalo, 
and if it is not disturbed it gorges itself so as to 
swell its body into a transparent globe. The 
wound does not swell like that of the African 
mosquito, but it is infinitely more painful; and 
when multiplied a hundredfold and continued 
for so many successive days, it becomes an evil 
of such magnitude that cold, famine, and every 
other concomitant of an inhospitable climate 
must yield precedence to it. It chases the buf¬ 
falo to the plains, irritating him to madness; and 
the reindeer to the seashore from which they do 
not return till the scourge has ceased.” 

Captain Buchan records that he “observed 
myriads of insects frozen on the surface of a 
lake in Newfoundland and embedded in the 
solid ice. The next day by the powerful rays of 
the sun they were loosened from durance, be¬ 
came reanimated, and took their flight into air.” 


VI. 


FRANKLIN AND HIS TRAVELS 

T HE central figure in Arctic exploration in 
the first half of the nineteenth century 
was that of Sir John Franklin, who devoted 
himself to the cause of research with an enthu¬ 
siasm that ended only with his tragic death in 
the icy wilderness. Easy and pleasant paths 
had for him no attraction; and when the Magic 
North, with its fascinating dangers, stretched 
out to him its beckoning hand, he answered the 
call and set sail for the Polar Sea. 

His career as an Arctic explorer began in the 
year 1818, when he accompanied Captain 
Buchan into the Polar Sea, with the object of 
discovering the North Pole. But in conse¬ 
quence of an accident to one of the two vessels 
forming the expedition, a return was made to 
England before anything in the nature of dis¬ 
covery had been accomplished. 

Franklin’s opportunity came in the follow¬ 
ing year. The Government had determined 
upon sending an expedition from the shores of 
Hudson Bay by land, to explore the northern 
coast of America from the mouth of the Copper- 
mine River to the eastward. Captain Franklin, 

( 43 ) 


44 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


having been placed in charge of the expedition, 
sailed in May, 1819, in the Prince of Wales , a 
ship belonging to the Hudson .Bay Company. 
The small party included Hr. Richardson, an 
eminent scientist, and Lieutenant Back, who 
had already served with Franklin in the navy. 

Arriving at York Factory in Hudson Bay, 
the expedition set out from there in September, 
with portable boats or canoes. The intention 
was to follow the line of rivers and lakes, be¬ 
ginning with the Nelson and the Saskatchewan, 
and ending with the Slave and the Coppermine. 

Reaching Cumberland House, a long-estab¬ 
lished station on the Saskatchewan, Franklin 
received his first setback. According to the ar¬ 
rangements made in advance, he had expected 
to find there sufficient supplies, together with 
guides and hunters. But disagreements be¬ 
tween the rival trading companies had inter¬ 
fered with the plans, and thus the expedition 
was faced with a grave difficulty at the very out¬ 
set. There was nothing for it but to form new 
plans. 

As farther progress at that season was impos¬ 
sible, it was decided that the main party, with 
Dr. Richardson, should pass the winter at Cum¬ 
berland House; while Franklin, accompanied 
by Back and a seaman of the name of Hepburn, 
should push northward to Fort Chipewyan, on 


FRANKLIN S TRAVELS 


45 


the shore of Lake Athabasca, a distance of 857 
miles. 

Leaving Cumberland House in December 
with two small dog-sleighs and supplies for the 
journey, they traveled through the worst part 
of the winter; and after braving many dangers 
and enduring fearful sufferings, arrived at their 
destination late in March. 

Here they were joined some months later by 
the remainder of the expedition, which had hur¬ 
ried on as soon as the break-up of the ice in the 
spring had left a passage that could be navi¬ 
gated by the boats. The expedition was then 
organized, and, accompanied by interpreters 
and some Canadian boatmen, left Fort Chipe- 
wyan for Fort Providence, on the northern side 
of the Great Slave Lake. 

It was a brave, though disappointed, party 
that set out from Fort Chipewyan. The two 
trading companies who disputed the territory, 
and whose rivalry kept them practically on the 
verge of war, had again failed to deliver sup¬ 
plies to the expedition. There was little more 
than one day’s provisions in hand when the party 
started on its weary march. The supply of 
powder, too, was very scanty, but what they had 
was put to the best use; and the hunting and 
fishing yielded sufficient food to satisfy the 
pangs of hunger. 


46 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


When they left Fort Providence, the party 
consisted of twenty-eight men, besides three 
women and three children. In addition to the 
three canoes, a smaller one was taken to convey 
the women. “We were all in high spirits,” runs 
the record of the brave commander, “being 
heartily glad that the time had at length arrived 
when our course was to be directed towards the 
Coppermine River, and through a line of 
country which had not been previously visited 
by any European.” Soon after starting from 
the fort, the expedition was joined by a large 
party of Indian hunters under a chief, Akaitcho, 
by name. 

The hardships of the journey began before 
the party had traveled any distance. Fort Prov¬ 
idence was but a few days behind them when 
“the issue of dried meat for breakfast this morn¬ 
ing had exhausted all our stock; and no other 
provision remained but the portable soups and 
a few pounds of preserved meat.” On the rec¬ 
ommendation of Akaitcho, the hunters were 
furnished with ammunition and sent on ahead in 
the hope of finding reindeer; while many of the 
Indians, being also in distress for food, started 
on at a quicker pace than the expedition could 
travel. 

The story of these trying days makes sad 
reading. Starvation was constantly before the 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


47 


travellers. Entries such as these are to be found 
in Franklin’s diary: 

“11th August. Having caught sufficient 
trout, white fish, and carp yesterday and this 
morning to afford the party two hearty meals, 
and the men being recovered from their fatigue, 
we proceeded on our journey.” 

“13th August. We caught two fish this 
morning, but they were small, and furnished 
but a scanty breakfast for the party.” 

By this time, however, they were approaching 
the fires of their hunters, and they were hopeful 
of relief. Soon the eagerly desired food from 
the hunters came to appease the cravings of hun¬ 
ger, and for a little while the advance was con¬ 
tinued under happier conditions. But another 
trial was at hand. 

Winter set in much earlier than usual. By 
the 25th of August the pools were already frozen 
over. “Akaitcho arrived with his party, and we 
were cruelly disappointed at finding they had 
stored only fifteen reindeer for us. In the even¬ 
ing of the same day Akaitcho refused to accom¬ 
pany us in our proposed descent of the Copper- 
mine River. He stated that the attempt would 
be rash and dangerous, as the weather was cold, 
the leaves were falling, some geese had passed 
southward, and the winter would shortly set in. 
He considered that the lives of all who went on 


48 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


such a journey would be lost, and lie neither 
would go himself nor permit his hunters to ac¬ 
company us.” 

Being anxious at all hazards to push on to 
the sea, and establish himself for the winter at 
the mouth of the Coppermine, Franklin argued 
with Akaitcho, who appeared hurt that his coun¬ 
sel should not be accepted. 

“Well,” replied the chief, “I have said every¬ 
thing I can to dissuade you from this expedi¬ 
tion, on which, it seems, you wish to sacrifice 
your own lives, as well as those of the Indians 
who might attend you. However, if, after all 
I have said, you are determined to go, some of 
my young men shall join the party. It shall not 
be said that we permitted you to die alone after 
having brought you hither; but, from the mo¬ 
ment they embark in the canoes, I and my rela¬ 
tives will lament them as dead.” 

In the face of such a remonstrance Franklin 
had no alternative but to abandon his plans for 
the time being, and to settle down there for the 
winter. For ten months the party remained in 
huts, at a place which came to be called Fort 
Enterprise. It was a long and weary wait, but 
it was patiently endured. The provisions run¬ 
ning short, Lieutenant Back “volunteered to go 
and make the necessary arrangements for trans¬ 
porting the stores we expected from Cumber- 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


49 


land House, and endeavor to obtain some ad¬ 
ditional supplies from the establishments at 
Slave Lake. If any accident should have pre¬ 
vented the arrival of our stores, and the estab¬ 
lishments at Moose-Deer Island should be un¬ 
able to supply the deficiency, he was, if he found 
himself equal to the task, to proceed to Chipe- 
wyan.” 

Thinking nothing of the tremendous difficul¬ 
ties and dangers of the long journey across the 
ice and snow, but only of bringing relief to his 
famishing comrades, this brave man, accompan¬ 
ied by Wentzel, two Canadians, and two hunters 
with their wives, left Fort Enterprise in the 
depth of winter. 

Back’s account of his hazardous journey is of 
thrilling interest. Owing to the slow progress 
made by the wives of the hunters, they were able 
on the first day to travel only seven and a half 
miles. On the third day the weather was so ex¬ 
tremely hazy that they could not see ten yards 
in front of them, and the hunters feared they 
would lose the track of the route. Towards 
evening it became so thick that they could not 
proceed. 

They continued their journey, sometimes on 
frozen lakes, and at other times over craggy 
rocks; and when on the lakes they were much 
impeded by different parts which were not fro- 


50 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


zen. It was the 18th of October when Back and 
his companions left Fort Enterprise, and on the 
27th they “crossed two lakes and took a circuit¬ 
ous route, frequently over high hills, to avoid 
those lakes which were not frozen. During the 
day one of the women made a hole through the 
ice and caught a fine pike, which she gave to us. 
The Indians would not partake of it, from the 
idea that we should not have sufficient for our¬ 
selves. ‘We are accustomed to starve/ said 
they, ‘but you are not.’ ” 

Remaining for some time at Fort Providence 
until the Great Slave Lake should be frozen, 
they finally set out, being provided with dogs 
and sledges. It was exceedingly cold, and their 
journey was frequently hindered by large pieces 
of ice which had been thrown up by the violence 
of the waves. 

Next day the wind was so keen that the men 
proposed conveying Back in a sledge, that he 
might be less exposed; and to this, after some 
hesitation, he consented. Accordingly a rein¬ 
deer-skin and a blanket were laid along the 
sledge; and in these he was wrapped tight up 
to the chin, and lashed to the vehicle. 

In attempting to cross a large opening in the 
ice, the dogs fell into the water, and were saved 
with difficulty. “The poor animals/’ says Back, 
“suffered dreadfully from the cold, and nar- 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


51 


rowly escaped being frozen to death. We had 
quickened our pace towards the close of the 
day, but could not get sight of the land; and it 
was not till the sun had set that we perceived 
land about four miles to our left. It was then 
so cold that two of the party were frozen about 
the face and ears. I escaped through having 
the good fortune to possess a pair of gloves 
made of rabbit-skin, with which I kept con¬ 
stantly chafing the affected places. 

“At 6 P. M. we arrived at the fishing huts 
near Stoney Island, and remained there the 
night. The Canadians were not a little sur¬ 
prised at seeing us. They had already given us 
up for lost.” 

Finding that a sufficiency of food could not 
be provided at Moose-Deer Island, Back deter¬ 
mined to proceed to Lake Athabasca. On the 
route the snow was so deep that the dogs were 
obliged to stop every ten minutes to rest them¬ 
selves, “and the weather was so cold that we 
were compelled to run to keep ourselves from 
freezing. I was much galled by the strings of 
the snow-shoes during the day; and once I got 
a severe fall by the dogs running over one of my 
feet, and dragging me some distance, my snow- 
shoe having become entangled with the sledge. 

“We had much difficulty in proceeding, ow¬ 
ing to the poor dogs being quite worn out, and 


52 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


their feet perfectly raw. We endeavored to tie 
shoes on them, to afford them some little relief; 
but they continually came off when amongst 
deep snow, so that it entirely occupied one per¬ 
son to look after them. In this state they were 
hardly of any use amongst the steep ascents, 
where we were obliged to drag the sledges our¬ 
selves. My legs and ankles were now so swollen 
that it was excessively painful to drag the snow- 
shoes after me.” 

After undergoing all these privations, Back 
and his faithful band arrived at Fort Chipewyan 
in January. There they waited for several 
weeks. When they left they took with them 
four sledges laden with goods for the expedi¬ 
tion, and a fifth one belonging to the Hudson 
Bay Company. By March they reached Fort 
Enterprise, and had the pleasure of finding the 
other members of the expedition in good health. 

Back and his companions had been absent for 
five months. In that time they had travelled 
1104 miles on snow-shoes, with no other cover¬ 
ing at night than a blanket and a deerskin, with 
the thermometer frequently at forty degrees, 
and once at fifty-seven degrees, below zero, and 
sometimes passing two or three days without 
food. 

The winter at Fort Enterprise having come 
to an end, and the ice having given way suffi- 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


53 


ciently to permit of the canoes being launched 
on the Coppermine, Franklin and his party- 
hade farewell to Akaitcho and his Indians. 
In June, 1821, the party quitted their huts, “sin¬ 
cerely rejoicing that the long-wished-for day 
had arrived” when they “were to proceed to¬ 
wards the final object of the expedition.” 
Franklin anticipated returning to Fort Enter¬ 
prise when the winter should compel them to 
suspend their operations. He therefore ar¬ 
ranged with the Indians to lay in a supply of 
pemmican and other stores; but, as we shall 
presently see, they failed to fufill their obliga¬ 
tion, with consequences that nearly proved fatal 

to the entire expedition. 

It had already been found that the country 
between Cape Barrow and the Coppermine 
River would not supply the wants of the ex¬ 
pedition. Franklin determined, therefore, to 
make at once for Arctic Sound, and entering 
a river to which he gave the name of one of his 
companions, Hood, he navigated it as far as 
was practicable. Then leaving it, they' took the 
large canoes to pieces, and out of their mater¬ 
ials constructed two smaller ones which they 
could carry with them. They also lightened 
their luggage as far as they could with safety', 
and started on foot for Fort Enterprise across 


54 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


the country bearing the forbidding name of the 
Barren Grounds. 

It was a terrible march. Each day was filled 
with dangers and terrors. That a single mem¬ 
ber of the party passed through these exper¬ 
iences alive was nothing short of marvellous. 
“Heavy rain commenced at midnight,” reads 
one of the entries in Franklin’s journal, “and 
continued without intermission until five in the 
morning, when it was succeeded by snow, the 
wind soon increasing to a violent gale. As we 
had nothing to eat, and were destitute of the 
means of making a fire, we remained in our 
beds all the day; but the warmth of our blank¬ 
ets was insufficient to prevent us from feeling 
the severity of the frost. 

“There was no abatement of the storm next 
day; the snow had drifted around our tents to 
a depth of three feet, and even in the inside 
there was a covering of several inches on our 
blankets. Our sufferings from the cold in a 
comfortless canvas tent in such weather, and 
without fire, may easily be imagined. Our suf¬ 
ferings from hunger were even greater.” 

Just as the march was about to be com¬ 
menced on the following day, the gallant leader 
was seized with a fainting fit, in consequence of 
exhaustion and exposure to the wind. After 
eating a morsel of portable soup, he recovered 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


55 


so far as to be able to move on. But weak and 
almost helpless as he was, he “was unwilling 
at first to take this morsel of soup, which was 
diminishing the only remaining meal for the 
party; but several of the men urged me to it with 
much kindness.” 

The miseries of the journey never for a mo¬ 
ment relaxed. Hunger and cold were the con¬ 
stant companions of the little band of heroes 
as they struggled on in their wretchedness. 
“The ground was covered a foot deep with 
snow,” we read; “the swamps over which we 
had to pass were entirely frozen; but the ice 
not being sufficiently strong to bear us, we fre¬ 
quently plunged knee-deep into the water. 
Those who carried the canoes were repeatedly 
blown down by the violence of the wind, and 
they often fell from making an insecure step 
on a slippery stone. 

“On one of these occasions the largest canoe 
was so much broken as to be rendered utterly 
unserviceable. This was a serious disaster, as 
the remaining canoe having through mistake 
been made too small, it was doubtful whether 
it would be sufficient to carry us across a river. 
Indeed, we found it necessary in crossing 
Hood’s River to lash the two canoes together. 
As several of the party were drenched from 
head to foot, and we were all wet to the middle, 


56 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


our clothes became stiff with frost, and we 
walked with much pain for the remainder of 
the day.” 

At the close of each day’s weary march, “the 
first operation, after encamping, was to thaw 
our frozen shoes, if a sufficient fire could be 
made, and dry ones were put on. Each person 
then wrote his notes of the daily occurrences, 
and evening prayers were read. As soon as 
supper was prepared it was eaten, generally 
in the dark, and we went to bed. We kept up 
a cheerful conversation until our blankets were 
thawed by the heat of our bodies, and we had 
gathered sufficient warmth to enable us to fall 
asleep. On many nights we had not even the 
luxury of going to bed in dry clothes, for when 
the fire was insufficient to dry our shoes we 
durst not venture to pull them off, lest they 
should freeze so hard as to be unfit to put on 
in the morning.” 

Coming to the Coppermine River, they 
looked for a ford, but none could be found. 
To avoid a long detour, which the party in 
their weakened condition were not able to face, 
it was necessary to construct some kind of raft 
by which they could cross the stream. As wil¬ 
lows were growing within easy reach, the pros¬ 
pect seemed favorable enough. 

During a halt for the purpose of consider- 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


57 


ing the subject, the carcass of a deer was dis¬ 
covered in the cleft of a rock into which it had 
fallen. A fire was kindled, and a large por¬ 
tion of it was consumed on the spot. 

Encouraged by this unexpected meal, the 
men worked with enthusiasm at the construc¬ 
tion of a raft; but when launched, it proved 
less buoyant than had been anticipated, and at¬ 
tempts to cross with it met with repeated fail¬ 
ure. The prospect of getting to the other side 
of the river now seemed hopeless; and again 
despair fell upon the party. 

At this stage, when the outlook appeared so 
black, Dr. Richardson stepped forward, -vol¬ 
unteering to swim across the river with a line, 
and to haul the raft over. Under any circum¬ 
stances this undertaking would have been at¬ 
tended with considerable danger; but reduced 
as he was to a skeleton through want of food 
and exposure to the cold, the risk was much in¬ 
creased. The brave doctor, however, was pre¬ 
pared to sacrifice his own life, if only he could 
do something to relieve the sufferings of the 
others. 

Just as he was about to step into the water, 
he put his foot on a dagger, which cut him to 
the bone; but this misfortune did not turn him 
from his heroic purpose. Plunging into the 
stream, with a line around his body, he struck 


58 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


out for the opposite shore; but he had got only 
a short distance from the bank when his arms 
became benumbed with the cold, and he lost the 
power of moving them. 

Even then he would not confess himself 
beaten. Turning on his back, he continued to 
persevere, and had almost reached the other 
side of the stream, when his legs also became 
powerless; and, to the consternation of his com¬ 
panions, he began to sink. They instantly 
pulled upon the line; Dr. Richardson came 
again to the surface, and was gradually drawn 
ashore frozen nearly rigid and in an almost 
lifeless state. 

“Rolled up in blankets, he was placed before 
a good fire of willows; and, fortunately, was 
just able to speak sufficiently to give some 
slight directions respecting the manner of treat¬ 
ing him. He recovered strength gradually, 
and by evening was able to be moved into the 
tent. We then learned that the skin on the 
whole of his left side was deprived of feeling, 
in consequence of exposure to too great heat. 
He did not completely recover the sensation of 
that side until the following summer.” 

The condition of the expedition now seemed 
more pitiable and hopeless than ever. Hood 
was reduced to a shadow; Back was so feeble 
as to require the support of a stick in walking; 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


59 


while Dr. Richardson suffered from lameness, 
in addition to his extreme weakness. 

At last another raft was constructed. The 
travellers were drawn, one by one, across the 
river; and hope revived at the prospect of 
reaching Fort Enterprise within a few days. 
Here they expected to find, according to the in¬ 
structions given to the Indians, a supply of 
pemmican and other stores awaiting them. 

Relief, however, was not so close at hand; 
and further miseries were to be endured before 
the end of the terrible journey was reached. 
To hasten the procuring of relief, Franklin de¬ 
spatched Back, with two of the Canadians, to 
search for the Indians. 

The little party, now reduced to five persons, 
including Franklin, continued their march to 
Fort Enterprise, suffering acute agony all the 
time. “At length,” writes Franklin, “we 
reached Fort Enterprise, and to our infinite 
disappointment and grief found it a deserted 
habitation. There was no deposit of provisions, 
no trace of the Indians, no letter from Mr. 
Wentzel to tell where the Indians might be 
found. It would be impossible for me to de¬ 
scribe our feelings; the whole party shed tears, 
not so much for our own fate as for that of 
our friends in the rear, whose lives depended 
on our sending immediate relief.” 


60 


FRANKLIN S TRAVELS 


Meanwhile, after prolonged search, Back 
reached the Indians’ camp, and at once started 
several of the Indians to the fort, giving them 
only a small supply of provisions in order that 
they might travel quickly. Back had conducted 
his search with splendid courage and determin¬ 
ation, suffering terrible privations, and subsist¬ 
ing, with his two companions, for several days, 
upon a pair of leather trousers and a pair of 
old shoes. One of the men died from exhaus¬ 
tion, and Back and the remaining hunter were 
reduced to the last extremity when they reached 
Akaitcho’s camp. They were barely able to 
deliver their message. 

The relief which they were able to send to 
their fellow-sufferers at Fort Enterprise was 
received with gratitude too deep for words. 
“Praise be unto the Lord,” wrote Franklin in 
his diary under date of November 7. “We 
were this day rejoiced by the appearance of In¬ 
dians, with supplies, at noon.” 

What remains to be told of this expedition 
can be put into a few words. Carrying with 
them further supplies, the Indians reached the 
fort, and with much kindness nursed and fed 
the dying men, bringing them back from the 
mouth of the grave, and guiding them, when a 
week later they were able to face the journey, 
to Fort Providence. The winter was spent at 


FRANKLIN’S TRAVELS 


61 


Moose-Deer Island, and England was safely 
reached in the following October. 

“Thus terminated,” wrote Franklin, “our 
long, fatiguing, and disastrous travels in North 
America, having journeyed by water and land 
(including our navigation of the Polar Sea) 
5550 miles.” 


VII 


THE TRAGIC FATE OF FRANKLIN 


A FTER an interval of almost twenty 
years, Franklin ventured once again into 
the Arctic Circle. The story of this enter¬ 
prise, which involved not only his death, but 
also that of all the brave men who accompanied 
him, is the most tragic and pathetic in the long 
history of Polar exploration. 

The English nation was still very keen to 
discover the Northwest route to the Pacific and, 
after an interval, the naval department set 
about plans for a new venture. Franklin fav¬ 
ored the proposal to send another expedition; 
his old enthusiasm for research in the Polar re¬ 
gions burned as brightly as ever, and he was 
eager to act as commander. “Let me see, Sir 
John,” said the First Lord of Admiralty to the 
Arctic veteran; “y° u are sixty, are you not?” 
“No, no, my lord,” quickly replied Franklin; 
“only fifty-nine.” Soon after this Franklin 
was appointed to the command of an expedi¬ 
tion, and two ships, the Erebus and the Terror, 
were commissioned to make a new attempt to 
find the passage which had lured so many bold 
seamen into the icy seas. 

( 62 ) 


TRAGIC FATE OF FRANKLIN 63 


Sailing in May, 1845, the expedition reached 
Whale Fish Islands in the early part of July. 
There a transport ship, which had accompanied 
the two vessels, parted company with them, 
carrying back the last letters ever received from 
the explorers. These were written in the most 
cheerful spirit. Among them was a despatch 
from Franklin: “The ships are now complete 
with supplies of every kind for three years; 
they are, therefore, very deep, but happily we 
have no reason to expect much sea as we pro¬ 
ceed.” On the 26th of the same month, the ex¬ 
pedition was seen waiting for a favorable op¬ 
portunity of crossing middle ice on the way to 
Lancaster Sound; and then it disappeared into 
the frozen zone, to find its grave amid the 
eternal ice. 

The absence of news from the ships did not 
for a time give rise to any alarm, as they car¬ 
ried sufficient provisions to last for three years; 
and other expeditions, notably that of Sir John 
Ross, which was locked in the ice for four win¬ 
ters, had been absent for years without being 
able to communicate with the outside world. 

Ross sounded one of the first notes of alarm. 
He expressed the conviction that Franklin’s 
ships were frozen up at the western end of Mel¬ 
ville Island, whence their return would be for¬ 
ever prevented by the ice accumulating behind 


64 TRAGIC FATE OF FRANKLIN 


them. It was thought, however, by the Ad¬ 
miralty that the second winter of Sir John 
Franklin’s absence was too early a period to 
give rise to alarm for his safety. Nevertheless, 
they invited the opinions of naval officers who 
had been employed in Arctic expeditions. 
Their replies were sufficiently alarming to stir 
the Government into sending relief parties. 
Thus began a search which for the next ten 
years was watched with eager interest by the 
whole civilized world. 

It was not from Britain alone that these ex¬ 
peditions were now despatched. America and 
France also assisted in the search. Party after 
party, both private and public, numbering al¬ 
together about forty, and following each other 
in rapid succession set out on their mission of 
mercy, some of them to end in disaster. 

It was not till 1854 that any light was shed 
upon the fate of Franklin and the courageous 
men who had accompanied him. Returning 
from a search instituted by the Hudson Bay 
Company, Dr. John Rae reported having met 
with a party of Eskimos, who told him that 
about six years before they had fallen in with 
a company of white men dragging their boats 
and sledges over the ice, who by signs com¬ 
municated to them the fact that their ship had 
been crushed in the ice. Later on, the Eskimos 


TRAGIC FATE OF FRANKLIN 65 


had discovered the boats and the graves of 
many of these men. In proof of their story, 
they produced silver spoons and forks, which 
Dr. Rae purchased from them. As these ob¬ 
jects had without doubt belonged to the missing 
expedition, the story of the Eskimos was un¬ 
hesitatingly accepted in Britain; and Rae and 
his party received a reward of ten thousand 
pounds offered for tidings of the expedition. 

There seemed little more to learn; but Lady 
Franklin, brave and patient during her long 
and trying ordeal, was not yet satisfied. Eager 
to learn more particulars of her husband’s fate, 
she pressed upon the Government the necessity 
of following up the traces found by Dr. Rae. 
But the Government, coming to a conclusion 
that there was now no prospect of saving life, 
and that another expedition to the Arctic seas 
would not be justified, declined to take further 
steps. 

Though disappointed in that quarter, Lady 
Franklin was determined that still another 
search should be made, and equipped an ex¬ 
pedition at her own expense. Captain McClin- 
tock, was invited to the command, and many of 
his companions in previous Arctic voyages vol¬ 
unteered their services. 

The Fox, a small steam-yacht of 160 tons, 
was chartered for the enterprise, and provi- 


66 TRAGIC FATE OF FRANKLIN 


sioned for a two years’ absence. The Govern¬ 
ment, although declining to be responsible for 
the expedition, liberally assisted with supplies. 
The departure was finally made in the summer 
of 1857, with Lieutenant Hobson as second in 
command, and Captain Young, as navigating 
officer. 

It seemed almost too much to expect that 
where so many other expeditions had failed, the 
little Fox would meet with success; but after 
being locked up in the ice-pack for eight 
months, daily in danger of being crushed to 
pieces, the tiny vessel reached the region that 
had been the scene of Franklin’s imprisonment; 
and investigations were made respecting the ill- 
fated expedition. 

From the discoveries of Rae and McClin- 
tock, it is possible to trace with tolerable ac¬ 
curacy the movements of Franklin and his 
party from the point at which they disappeared. 
Grim, indeed, was the tragedy that was at 
length revealed—the weary imprisonment amid 
the ice during the long winters of endless dark¬ 
ness and the short summers of continuous light; 
the hope of relief that never came; the passing 
away of the gallant old commander before the 
final catastrophe fell upon his brave men; the 
abandoning of the ships to their fate; and the 
toilsome march over the ice in the vain struggle 


TRAGIC FATE OF FRANKLIN 67 


to escape death—that was the terrible story of 
the expedition which, full of hope, had sailed 
from England in 1845. 

The first winter was spent at Beechey 
Island, comfortably enough, no doubt; for, well 
provisioned as the vessels were, there would be 
no lack of food. When the summer of 1846 
arrived, Franklin attempted to move south¬ 
ward. The two ships struggled bravely 
among the grinding icebergs of Peel Sound 
and Franklin Strait, but made little advance 
against the difficulties that barred their prog¬ 
ress. Early in September the winter suddenly 
began; and to the north of Cape Felix, the 
most northerly point of King William’s Land, 
the Erebus and the Terror were again bound 
in the iron grip of the frozen sea. There they 
were bandied backwards and forwards by the 
shifting ice, and in constant danger of being 
ground to pieces. 

In the spring of 1847, Lieutenant Graham 
Gore of the Erebus, accompanied by another 
officer and six men, was despatched with sledges 
to King William’s Land. Reaching Point 
Victory, they deposited there a brief record of 
the circumstances in which the expedition then 
stood: “All well. Party consisting of two of¬ 
ficers and six men left ships on Monday, May 
24,1847.” 


68 TRAGIC FATE OF FRANKLIN 


About a year later a mournful addition was 
made to his record. “H.M. ships Terror and 
Erebus were deserted on the 22nd April, five 
leagues ^northwest of this, having been beset 
since 12th September, 1846.” “The officers and 
crews, consisting of 105 souls, under the com¬ 
mand of Captain Crozier, landed here. Sir 
John Franklin died on the 11th June, 1847; 
and the total loss by deaths in the expedition 
has been to this date nine officers and fifteen 
men.” 

When Franklin died there was still the an¬ 
ticipation of ultimate success; but the short 
Arctic summer came and went, and the ships 
remained bound in the ice-pack. Then another 
dreary winter set in, bringing added fears and 
terrors with it, as the prospect of release from 
the icy prison seemed more remote than ever. 

The spring of 1848 came on, and Captain 
Crozier, who had succeeded to the command of 
the party after the death of Franklin, felt that 
the only chance of life was to abandon the ships. 
Accordingly, 105 men took to the ice. Boats 
placed on runners and sledges had been pre¬ 
pared, with the intention of journeying to the 
mainland by way of Back’s Great Fish River, 
the mouth of which was 250 miles away from 
the spot at which the vessels then lay. It was 
a cold and dismal, as well as a dangerous, jour- 




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TRAGIC FATE OF FRANKLIN 69 


nev, undertaken only when no other way of es¬ 
cape seemed possible, and when the failure of 
provisions rendered it absolutely necessary. 

What happened on that fatal march can be 
gathered from the story of the Eskimos, who 
told Dr. Rae that they sold seal’s flesh to the 
white men. From a band of the same people 
McClintock learned that the explorers dropped 
their drag-ropes on the march, and died where 
they fell. A scanty remnant of about forty 
men, according to the estimate of the Eskimos, 
reached the vicinity of the Great Fish River, 
battling with the energy of despair against the 
fate that was overtaking them, and that left 
none to tell the story. 

Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow in the 
depth of the Russian winter was not more ter¬ 
rible than the march of this brave company 
across the wilderness. Overcome by fatigue 
and cold, the enfeebled explorers dropped out 
of the ranks one by one and lay down in the 
snow to die. Thus the band grew smallei as 
the journey continued. Those who remained 
pushed on with weary footsteps, and with hope 
and despair alternating at their hearts. Daily 
the death-roll increased till the last man of all 
dropped and the curtain fell on the final scene. 

But the ill-fated expedition had not been in 
vain. It had succeeded in proving the existence 


70 TRAGIC FATE OF FRANKLIN 


of the long-sought Northwest Passage, hav¬ 
ing connected Lancaster Strait with the navi¬ 
gable channel that extends along the continent 
to Behring Strait, thus uniting a known track 
on the east with a known track on the west. 


VIII 


HOW DR. KANE ESCAPED FROM AN 

ICY PRISON 


S OME one has said that the death of Frank¬ 
lin did more to add to our knowledge 
of the Polar regions than had been ac¬ 
complished by his life. His strange disappear¬ 
ance amid the Arctic wastes was the signal for 
a remarkable series of attempts to penetrate 
into the ice-bound territory around the North 
Pole, with the view of discovering the fate of the 
brave explorer, and, if not too late, of rescuing 
him and his gallant crews. 

The spirit of heroic daring and courage 
characterized all these expeditions; but the 
story of one of them, that led by Dr. Elisha 
Kent Kane, of America, deserves more than a 
passing reference. In all the literature of 
Polar exploration and adventure there is little 
to compare with the record of suffering and 
endurance set forth in the journal of this heroic 
commander. 

For twenty-one months the vessel containing 
the search party was firmly locked in the very 
jaws of death. Provisions ran short; scurvy 
attacked the crew; accidents happened which 

( 71 ) 


72 


DR. KANE S ICY PRISON 


threatened the lives of all the expedition; and 
for months starvation stared them in the face. 
But amid it all, Kane’s marvelous confidence 
in ultimate success never wavered. He hoped 
on, when every one else was resigned to death; 
and eventually he led his diminished band back 
to civilization across a stretch of ice and water 
for 1300 miles, after their vessel had been aban¬ 
doned to its fate. 

An experienced traveller and explorer be¬ 
fore undertaking this expedition, Kane had 
been engaged, under Lieutenant De Haven, in 
an expedition which sailed from the United 
States in 1850 in search of Sir John Franklin; 
and, in the month of December, 1852, he was 
commissioned by the Secretary of the Navy to 
lead another party on the same humane mis¬ 
sion. Setting out on board a vessel named the 
Advance , the expedition purposed passing up 
Baffin Bay to its most northerly attainable 
point; and thence, pressing on toward the Pole 
as far as boats or sledges could carry them, to 
examine the coast for possible traces of the lost 
party. 

The departure was made from New York, 
May 30, 1853; and two months later we find the 
Advance off the coast of Greenland in immi¬ 
nent peril from the ice. The ship was fastened to 
an iceberg, and had barely time to cast off be- 


DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 


73 


fore the face of the berg fell in ruins, crashing 
with a noise like thunder. 

The passage through Melville Bay was made 
without mishap, and then in the waters farther 
north the old enemy of navigation in these re¬ 
gions was encountered. “Directly in our way,” 
reads the journal entry for 20th August, “just 
beyond the line of floe-ice against which we 
were alternately sliding and thumping, was a 
group of bergs. We had no power to avoid 
them; and the only question was, whether we 
were to be dashed to pieces against them, or 
whether they might not offer us some nook of ref¬ 
uge from the storm. But as we neared them, 
we perceived that they were at some distance 
from the floe-edge, and separated from it by an 
interval of open water. Our hopes rose as the 
gale drove us toward this passage and into it, 
when, from some unexplained cause—prob¬ 
ably an eddy of the wind against the lofty ice- 
walls—we lost our headway. Almost at the 
same moment we saw that the bergs were not 
at rest; that they were bearing down upon the 
other ice, and that it must be our fate to be 
crushed between the two. 

“Just then a broad sconce-piece or low water- 
washed berg came driving up from the south¬ 
ward. The thought flashed upon me of one of 
our escapes in Melville Bay, and as the sconce 



74 


DR. KANE S ICY PRISON 


moved rapidly alongside us, McGarry man¬ 
aged to plant an anchor on its slope, and to 
hold on to it, by a whale-line. It was an anx¬ 
ious moment. Our noble tow-horse hauled us 
bravely on, the spray dashing over his flanks, 
and his forehead ploughing up the smaller ice 
as if in scorn. The bergs encroached upon us 
as we advanced; our channel narrowed to a 
width of perhaps forty feet. We passed clear 
of the impending ice-walls, and into compara¬ 
tively open water; but it was a close shave. 
Never did men acknowledge with more grati¬ 
tude their deliverance from a wretched death.” 

Reaching latitude 78° 43' N., the Advance 
was frozen up; and then, with the long night 
already upon them, the party settled down to 
the experience of an Arctic winter. From the 
very outset the difficulties and dangers de¬ 
scended thick and fast. The sledge-dogs fell 
into chasms; the sledge parties met with dis¬ 
asters, and were rescued only after heroic ef¬ 
forts; and disease and death were already busy 
among the men. 

By the beginning of April, Kane is lament¬ 
ing the fact that the week just ended has left 
him nothing to remember but anxieties and sor¬ 
row. Nearly all the party were then tossing in 
their sick-bunks, some frozen, and others un¬ 
dergoing amputations. By the end of the 


DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 


75 


month came the short season available for Arc¬ 
tic research, and though the condition of things 
on board the ship was far from satisfactory, 
the leader pushed ahead with the preparations 
for renewed exploration. 

Sledge parties started off from the vessel; 
but on the 20th of May, Dr. Kane, propped 
up by pillows and surrounded by sick mess¬ 
mates, recorded the fact that he had again failed 
to force the passage to the north. Scurvy had 
broken out among the men; some of them suf¬ 
fered from snowblindness; and the leader him¬ 
self, fainting and delirious, was saved from 
death only by the devotion of five of his men, 
themselves scarcely able to move. In addition, 
the heavy snows rendered travelling extremely 
difficult. It was thus a disappointed and dis¬ 
couraged party that returned to the shelter of 
the ship, with nothing to show but trouble and 
defeat. 

It was characteristic of Kane, that as soon as 
he was sufficiently recovered to be aware of his 
failure he began to devise means for remedying 
it. The resources of the party were, however, 
shattered. There were only three men able to 
do duty. Of the officers, Dr. Hayes was the 
only one left on his feet. 

Determining to trust in future almost en¬ 
tirely to the dogs for travel, Kane despatched 


76 DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 

Hayes on a sledge journey of exploration, 
which succeeded in connecting the northern 
coast with the survey of a previous expedition; 
but it disclosed no channel or means of exit 
from the bay in which the ship lay. Dr. Kane 
was convinced, however, that such a channel 
must exist, “for this great curve could be no 
cul-de-sac?’ 

To verify this theory he immediately began 
the organization of a double party, the field of 
which was to be the hundred miles to the north¬ 
east, which would complete their entire circuit 
of that frozen water. Two sledge parties were 
despatched. They returned in safety after 
their survey; but they had accomplished little 
to solve the doubts and difficulties of the situa¬ 
tion. 

The summer was wearing on, but still the ice 
did not break up as expected; and as far as 
could be seen it remained perfectly solid be¬ 
tween the expedition and Baffin Bay. 

On the 8th of July, Dr. Kane, reviewing the 
situation, took a rather despondent view of 
their being able to find a passage through the 
pack-ice. He was afraid that the winter might 
set in before they were half-way through. 
“There never was,” he confides in his journal, 
“and I trust never will be, a party worse armed 
for the encounter of a second Arctic winter. 


DR. KANE S ICY PRISON 77 

We have neither health, fuel, nor provisions. 
Dr. Hayes, and indeed all I have consulted, de¬ 
spond at the thought; and when I look around 
upon our diseased and disabled men, and think 
of the fearful work of the last long night, I am 

tempted to feel as they do.” 

The alternative of abandoning the vessel at 
that early stage of the enterprise did not com¬ 
mend itself to the commander. But what was 
he to do? We find him arguing with himself, 
“How are we to get along with our sick and 
amputated men? It is a dreary distance at the 
best to Upernavik or Beechey Island, our only 
places of refuge, and a precarious journey even 
if we were all fit for moving. But we are hard¬ 
ly one-half in efficiency of what we count in 
number. Besides, how can I deseit the brig 
while there is still a chance of saving her? My 
mind is made up; I will not do it. 

Determining to examine the ice-field for 
himself, Kane started off on a long sledge jour¬ 
ney, and, as a result of this survey, he resolved 
to attempt in person to communicate with 
Beechey Island. He was confident that if he 
could get there, he would be sure of the much- 
needed assistance. 

He was quite aware that this was a hazardous 
venture, but he regarded it as a matter of duty. 
Besides, he was the only one possessed of the 


78 


DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 


necessary knowledge of Lancaster Sound and 
its ice-movements. 

Taking with him five men and the boat 
named the Forlorn Hope , which was mounted 
on a large sledge till the open water was 
reached, the little party proceeded on its south¬ 
ern journey, fighting daily with ice-floes, be¬ 
ing nipped in the ice, and hauling the boat on 
the floes, sometimes as many as a dozen times 
a day, to escape the pressure of the floating 
masses. 

At last, on 31st day of July, says Kane, “at 
the distance of ten miles from Cape Parry, we 
came to a dead halt. A solid mass lay directly 
across our path, extending onward to our far¬ 
thest horizon. There were bergs in sight to 
the westward; and by walking for some four 
miles over the moving floe in that direction. 
McGarry and myself succeeded in reaching 
one. We climbed it to a height of a hundred 
and twenty feet, and, looking out from it with 
my spy-glass to the south and west, we saw 
that all within a radius of thirty miles was a 
motionless, unbroken, and impenetrable sea.” 

This was a great disappointment. It was 
obvious that any further attempt to penetrate 
to the south must be hopeless, till the ice-bar¬ 
rier should undergo a change. There was noth¬ 
ing for it hut to return to the brig and face 


DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 


79 

another winter among the ice, with all the mis¬ 
eries which such a situation involved. “It is 
horrible—yes, that is the only word,” wrote 
Kane in his diary—“to look forward to another 
year of disease and darkness, without fresh 
food and without fuel. I should meet it with 
less sadness if I had no comrades to think for 
and protect.” 

A few days later it was made clear beyond 
all doubt that the brig could not escape; and, 
calling the officers and crew together, Kane 
frankly explained the considerations which had 
determined him to remain where he was. He 
endeavored to show them that an escape to open 
water could not succeed, and that the effort 
must be exceedingly hazardous; but he was per¬ 
fectly willing to give his permission to such as 
were desirous of making the attempt. 

Eight out of the seventeen survivors of the 
party resolved to stand by the brig; the re¬ 
sources were divided, and on August 28th, “the 
remainder of the party moved off with the elas¬ 
tic step of men confident in their purpose, and 
were out of sight in a few hours. Months 
later, however, after many trials and hardships, 
and when they had failed in their purpose, the 
men who had departed so hopefully returned 
to the ship to share once more the unhappy 
fortunes of their suffering comrades. 


80 


DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 


It is not to be wondered at that the departure 
of half the crew had a depressing effect on 
those who remained behind, and that dark fore¬ 
bodings should occupy their thoughts. “The 
reduced numbers of our party, the helplessness 
of many, the decreasing efficiency of all, the im¬ 
pending winter, with its cold, dark night, our 
reduced resources, the dreary sense of isola¬ 
tion—these,” wrote Kane, “made the staple of 
our thoughts. For a time Sir John Franklin 
and his party, our daily topic through so many 
months, gave place to the question of our own 
fortunes—how we were to escape, how to live.” 

The problem of how to live was certainly 
not an easy one to solve. But something had 
to be done, and one day a sealing expedition 
was organized. During the progress of the 
hunt, the party passed upon a belt of ice that 
was obviously unsafe. It was more than a mile 
to the nearest lump of solid ice, and to reach 
it the dogs were urged on with whip and voice. 
Everything depended on the dogs. It was a 
desperate race. The worst seemed over, when, 
within fifty paces from the solid ice, the dogs 
suddenly paused, terrified by the heaving of 
the ice. The left-hand runner went through; 
the leader followed, and a second later the en¬ 
tire left of the sledge was submerged. 

Leaning forward to liberate the dogs, Kane 


DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 


81 


found himself swimming in a little circle of ice 
and water. “I succeeded in cutting poor Tood’s 
lines,” he afterwards wrote, in describing these 
moments of horror, “and let him scramble to 
the ice, for the poor fellow was drowning me 
with his piteous caresses. I made for the 
sledge; but I found that it would not buoy me, 
and I had no resource left but to try the circum¬ 
ference of the hole. Around this I paddled, 
the ice always yielding when my hopes of 
lodgment were greatest. During this process I 
enlarged my circle of operations to a very un¬ 
comfortable diameter, and was beginning to 
feel weaker after every effort. 

“Hans meanwhile had reached the firm ice, 
and was on his knees, praying incoherently in 
English and Eskimo. At every fresh crushing- 
in of the ice he would ejaculate ‘God!’ and when 
I recommenced my paddling he recommenced 
his prayers. I was nearly gone. As a last 
chance I threw myself on my back, so as to 
lessen as much as possible my weight, and I 
placed the nape of my neck against the edge 
of the ice. Then I slowly bent my leg, and, 
placing my moccasined foot against the sledge, 
I pressed steadily, listening to the half-yielding 
crunch of the ice beneath. 

“Presently I felt that my head was pillowed 
by the ice, and that my wet fur coat was slid- 


82 


DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 


ing up the surface. Next came my shoulders; 
they were fairly on. One more decided push, 
and I was launched up on the ice, and safe. 
We saved all the dogs; but the sledge, kayak, 
tent, gun, snowshoes, and everything besides 
were left behind.” 

But Dr. Kane’s journal is by no means lim¬ 
ited to a record of hardships. There are bits of 
description and lighter touches which make it 
one of the most entertaining of Arctic books. 
Thus he writes, September 13: 

“The navigation is certainly exciting. I 
have never seen a description in my Arctic 
readings of anything like this. We are literally 
running for our lives, surrounded by the immi¬ 
nent hazards of sudden consolidation in an open 
sea. All minor perils, nips, bumps, and sunken 
bergs are discarded; we are staggering along 
under all sail, forcing our way while we can. 
One thump, received since I commenced writ¬ 
ing, jerked the time-keeper from our binnacle 
down the cabin hatch, and, but for our strong 
bows, seven and a half solid feet, would have 
stove us in. Another time, we cleared a tongue 
of the main jack by riding it down at eight 
knots.” 

“We were obliged,” he continues, “several 
times the next day to bore through the young 
ice; for the low temperature continued, and our 


DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 


83 


wind lulled under Cape Hotham. The night 
gave us now three hours of complete darkness. 
It was danger to run on, yet equally danger to 
pause. Grim water was following close upon 
our heels; and even the Captain, sanguine and 
fearless in emergency as he always proved him¬ 
self, as he saw the tenacious fields of sludge 
and pancake thickening around us, began to 
feel anxious. 

“Mine was a jumble of sensations. I had 
been desirous to the last degree that we might 
remain on the field of search, and could hardly 
be satisfied at what promised to realize my wish. 
Yet I had hoped that our wintering would be near 
our English friends, that in case of trouble or 
disease we might mutually sustain each other. 
But the interval of fifty miles between us, in 
these inhospitable deserts, was as complete a 
separation as an entire continent; and I con¬ 
fess that I looked at the dark shadows closing 
around Barlow Inlet, the prison from which 
we cut ourselves on the seventh, just six days 
before, with feelings as sombre as the landscape 
itself. The sound of our vessel crunching her 
way through the new ice is not easy to describe. 

It was not like the grinding of the old formed 

• 11 
ice. 

A little later Dr. Kane says: “On the 22d 
of September our latitude was 75 ° 24' 21". I 


84 


DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 


now saw land to the north and west; its horizon 
of rolling ground without bluffs terminating 
at its northern end. Still further on to the 
north came a strip without visible land, and 
then land again with mountain tops distant and 
rising above the clouds. This last was the 
land to which Captain De Haven gave the 
name of Grinnell Land, and which perpetu¬ 
ates for all time the name of Henry Grinnell the 
sole promoter of the expedition. The follow¬ 
ing year the same land was seen by Captain 
Penny and given the name of Albert Land in 
honor of Price Albert, and for some time a con¬ 
troversy waged on the matter, somewhat to the 
discredit of Great Britain. Here are some 
graphic passages from Dr. Kane’s journal of 
his first Arctic winter. Writing under date of 
September 23 he describes a fatal break-up of 
the ice: 

“How shall I describe to you its pressure, 
its fearfulness and sublimity! Nothing I have 
seen or read of approaches it. The voices of 
the ice and the heavy swash of the overturned 
hummock-tables are at this moment dinning in 
my ears. ‘All hands’ are on deck fighting our 
grim enemy. 

“Fourteen inches of solid ice thickness, with 
some half dozen of snow, are, with the slow uni¬ 
form advance of a mighty propelling power, 


DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 


85 


driving in upon our vessel. As they strike her* 
the semi-plastic mass is impressed with a mould 
of her side, and then, urged on by the force 
behind, slides upward, and rises in great verti¬ 
cal tables. When these attain their utmost 
height, still pressed on by others, they topple 
over, and form a great embankment of fallen 
tables. At the same time, others take a down¬ 
ward direction, and when pushed on, as in the 
other case, form a similar pile underneath. 
The side on which one or the other of these ac¬ 
tions take place for the time varies with the di¬ 
rection of the force, and the strength of the op¬ 
posite or resisting side, the inclination of the 
vessel, and the weight of the superincumbent 
mounds; and as these conditions follow each 
other in varying succession, the vessel becomes 
perfectly imbedded after a little while in crum¬ 
bling and fractured ice.” 

“We are lifted bodily eighteen inches out of 
water,” continues Dr. Kane. “The hummocks 
are reared up around the ships, so as to rise in 
some cases a couple of feet above our bul¬ 
warks—five feet above our deck. They are 
very often ten and twelve feet high. All hands 
are out, laboring with picks and crowbars to 
overturn the fragments that threaten to over¬ 
whelm us. Add to this darkness, snow, cold, 


86 DR. KANE’S ICY PRISON 

and the absolute destitution of surrounding 
shores.” 

“October 6, Sunday. 12 Midnight. They 
report us adrift. Wind, a gale from the north¬ 
ward and westward. An odd cruise this! The 
American expedition fast in a lump of ice about 
as big as Washington Square, and driving, like 
a shanty on a raft, before a howling gale. 

“November 25. 

“Our daylight to-day was a mere name, three 
and a half hours of meagre twilight. I was 
struck for the first time with the bleached faces 
of my mess-mates. 

“Seventy-seven days more without a sunrise! 
twenty-six before we reach the solstitial point 
of greatest darkness! 

“December 22, Sunday. The solstice!—the 
midnight of the year! 

“December 23, Monday. Perfect darkness! 
Drift unknown. Winds nearly at rest with the 
exception of a little gasp from the westward. 

“December 24, Tuesday. ‘Through utter 
darkness borne.’ 

“December 25. ‘Ye Christmas of ye Arctic 
cruisers!’ 

“Our Christmas passed without a lack of the 
good things of this life. ‘Goodies’ we had galore; 
but that best of earthly blessings, the communion 
of loved sympathies, these Arctic cruisers had 


DR. KANE S ICY PRISON 


87 


not. It was curious to observe the depressing in¬ 
fluences of each man’s home thoughts, and abso¬ 
lutely saddening the effort of each man to impose 
upon his neighbor and be very boon and jolly. 
We joked incessantly, but badly, too; ate of 
good things, and drank up a moiety of our Heid- 
sieck; and then we sang negro songs, wanting 
only time, measure, and harmony, but abound¬ 
ing in noise; and after a closing bumper to Mr. 
Grinnell, adjourned with creditable jollity from 
table to the theatre.” 

When men can laugh and jest in the face of 
death, it is not remarkable that they should live 
to escape their icy prison—as, in fact, they did 
a few months later. 

With the approach of spring it was decided 
to abandon the ship and make their way south 
by boats and sledges. The return journey was 
begun in May, and after eighty-four days of 
hardship they reached Upernavik, a distance of 
over 1300 miles, with the loss of only one man. 


IX 


FURTHER ADVENTURES OF AMER¬ 
ICAN EXPLORERS 


A MERICAN enthusiasm for Arctic discov¬ 
ery did not end with the expeditions that 
had gone in search of the missing Frank¬ 
lin party. American navigators continued their 
researches, drawn on by the ambition of plant¬ 
ing the Stars and Stripes at the most northerly 
point of the earth’s surface. 

Dr. Isaac Hayes, who had acted as surgeon 
with Kane’s expedition soon after his return to 
America, began preparing for a voyage of dis¬ 
covery under his own command, being convinced 
of the existence of an open Polar Sea. Having 
obtained support enabling him to fit out an ex¬ 
pedition, he sailed from Boston, in the schooner 
United States , in July, 1860, with a crew of 
twenty-one. Encountering a succession of furi¬ 
ous northerly gales near Cape Alexander, in 
which the ship was seriously damaged, Hayes 
found his progress hindered, and was compelled 
to winter in Foulke Fiord, to the south of Little¬ 
ton Island. 

In April, Hayes started out from the ship with 
dog-sledges, with the intention of crossing Kane 

( 88 ) 


FURTHER ADVENTURES 


89 


Basin and following its western shores to the 
north. On May 11, he reached Cape Hawks, 
situated about seventy miles from his head¬ 
quarters. 

When the summer arrived and the ice broke 
up, the United States made her way out of 
Foulke Fiord, reaching home in the autumn. 

The next American to lead an expedition into 
the icy wilderness of the North was Charles 
Francis Hall, who had long cherished the ambi¬ 
tion of planting his country’s flag at the Foie. 

His first acquaintance with the Arctic regions 
was in 1860, when, with the object of searching 
for the remains of Sir John Franklin’s expedi¬ 
tion, he braved the hardships of that land for 
three years, living alone among the Eskimos, 
and practising their customs and mode of living. 
Again, from 1864 till 1869, he renewed his ac¬ 
quaintance with the land and its people, and 
brought back relics of the Franklin expedition. 

These experiences, valuable in their way, 
were, however, but preparatory for the greater 
undertaking which Hall determined to make 
whenever he could procure the necessary sup¬ 
port. “Night and day, day and night,” he wrote 
to a friend, “weeks, months and years find my 
purpose fixed, without a shadow of wavering, on 
making that voyage. May Heaven spare my 
life to perform it!” 


90 FURTHER ADVENTURES 


Successful in obtaining the support of Con¬ 
gress, Hall was appointed to the command of the 
expedition. “From Upernavik or Tossak,” said 
his instructions, “you will proceed across Mel¬ 
ville Bay to Cape Dudley Digges, and thence 
you will make all possible progress with vessels, 
boats, and sledges towards the North Pole, using 
your own judgment as to the route or routes to 
be pursued, and the locality for each winter’s 
quarters. Having been provisioned for two and 
a half years, you will pursue your explorations 
for that period; but should the object of the ex¬ 
pedition require it, you will continue your ex¬ 
plorations to such a further length of time as 
your supplies may be safely extended. Should 
however, the main object of the expedition—viz., 
attaining the position of the North Pole—be ac¬ 
complished at an earlier period, you will return 
to the United States with all convenient des¬ 
patch.” 

Hall sailed from New York in 1871, in the 
Polaris, and was accompanied as far as God- 
haven by the steamship Congress as a supply ves¬ 
sel. On leaving America the officers and crew 
numbered twenty-three souls, to which ten 
others were added in Greenland. Excellent 
progress was made on the voyage, and Captain 
Hall was encouraged more than ever to hope 
for the success of the scheme. 


FURTHER ADVENTURES 


91 


Captain Hall in the substantial tome which 
records his voyagings has left many memorable 
pictures of Arctic travel. Here is one: “The 
first Sunday at Holsteinbory (Greenland) I de¬ 
termined to ascend the mountain on the north 
side of the harbor, and there worship in the 
great temple of the world’s Creator. In the 
morning accompanied by Sterry we began the 
ascent with a fine clear sky above and the glor¬ 
ious sun shining warmly upon us.” (This was 
early in July). “But ere we had gone far, 
swarms of mosquitoes came around. Fortu¬ 
nately I had long hair on my head, and my beard 
and mustache were also of great length. Sterry, 
however, had to cover his face with his handker¬ 
chief leaving two little holes for lookouts. 

“As we went on, streams of pure and sparkling 
cold water came dancing down the mountain¬ 
side, and at these we several times quenched our 
thirst. Thus steep after steep we mounted, but 
at what cost! The sun’s rays poured hot upon 
our backs, and both of us soon had to doff our 
coats, leaving the mosquitoes to work their will. 
All we could do was to push on quickly, to see if 
we could get into a higher region where these 
torments did not abound. But our bodies soon 
became weary; and the steepness of the way was 
such that one false step would have proved fatal. 
Yet we were not without some relief. Patches 


92 FURTHER ADVENTURES 


of broad-leaved laurel on the mountain-side re¬ 
freshed us greatly as we rested, and beds of moss 
covered with smiling flowers served for a tem¬ 
porary couch. 

“In about two hours we gained the summit, 
both of us covered with mosquitoes, and driven 
almost to madness by their stings. In vain we 
tried everything that mind could think of to get 
rid of them. Nothing availed, we were doomed 
by these merciless invaders, and our very life’s 
blood was drawn freely to satisfy their glutton¬ 
ous desires. 

“On the other side of the mountain we saw a 
beautiful little lake; and upon standing by its 
side, it was found to be clear as crystal, mirroring 
the lofty peaks above us. On its north shore 
was a low shingly beach, that had been thrown 
up by the winds coming in this, the only direc¬ 
tion they could cross the water. This lake was 
fed by various small streams that were leaping 
down from the snowy mountains, and if it had 
got no other name I christened it ‘William Sterry 
Lake.’ We walked along it, and saw numerous 
salmon, small trout, (three of which we caught 
with our hands), and many skulls and horns of 
deer.” 

The occasion and its description are so idyllic, 
that although space forbids we must continue: 

“It was now dinner-time, and our appetite 


FURTHER ADVENTURES 


93 


was well sharpened by the exercise we had en¬ 
joyed. Accordingly a fire was lit whereby to 
cook the fish, though at first I was greatly puz¬ 
zled how we were to get material for a fire. But 
Sterry who had been so much in this Arctic re¬ 
gion also knew its resources. Where all looked 
barren to me he soon found moss, and some low 
brushwood like the running hemlock of our own 
country. It is a tough shrub with small leaves 
and white blossoms, which produce black berries 
with red sweet juice. Dwarf-willow, heather, 
and small undergrowth wood of various descrip¬ 
tions are intermixed. The dead wood, the 
leaves, stakes and limbs of preceding years, are 
thickly interspersed with the growing portions 
of this fuel, and with this Sterry quickly made a 

fire. 

“A result followed, however, that we little ex¬ 
pected. The abundance of such fuel all around 
us caused the fire to spread rapidly, and as a 
strong breeze was blowing, it soon got beyond 
control. Sterry took this miniature forest fire 
very calmly. ‘Let it burn, said he, It can 
harm nothing hemmed in by these mountains. 
So I sat down to the primitive meal—a carpet 
of heather for our table, and huge precipices 
yawning close by, with high broken moun¬ 
tains that pierced the sky looking grimly down 
upon us. There is philosophy in everything, es- 


94 


FURTHER ADVENTURES 


pecially eating. The world eats too much—learn 
to live—to live as we ought a little food well 
eaten is better for any one than a banquet con¬ 
sumed with an ill-grace. Our pleasures have a 
higher relish when properly used. Thus we 
thoroughly enjoyed our food and after a short 
nap started on the return journey. 

“As we passed along I noticed several large 
rocks, thousands of tons in weight, that had evi¬ 
dently fallen from the tops of the lofty moun¬ 
tains, the detached portions corresponding in 
shape to the parts vacated. Everywhere were 
seen the effects of the freezing solid of the water 
that penetrates into the crevices. The tremen¬ 
dous workings of nature in these mountains of 
Greenland during the Arctic winter often result 
in what the inhabitants believe to be earth¬ 
quakes, when in fact the freezing of water is 
alone the cause! In descending we came across 
several clear little bubbling brooks, innumerable 
flowers and shrub—fuel in abundance. Peat 
was also plentiful. Fox-holes in numbers were 
seen, and a natural canal with an embankment, 
in appearance much like the levee of New 
Orleans.” 

This whole scene is so different from any¬ 
thing to which we have hitherto treated our 
readers, that we cannot bear to delete a sentence. 
One could imagine oneself for the moment in 



FURTHER ADVENTURES 95 


the finest parts of Switzerland, and yet this was 
Greenland. Here is another lively picture to 
contrast with the long tale of Arctic hardships: 

“On the 16th of July, we endeavored to re¬ 
turn the many kindnesses shown to us by the 
good people of Holsteinbory, by inviting them 
to a ball on board. The lieutenant-governor and 
lady, the schoolmaster and his wife, with their 
infant child at her back, and most all the town 
were there. Never did the George Henry and 
her crew look happier, gayer or present a more 
varied scene. With warm hearts, honest faces, 
and a ready mood for the fullest mirth of the 
hour did we enter upon the festive day. 

“The vessel was decorated for the occasion 
and it would amuse most friends at home 
could I tell all about that day. In the merry 
dance the Eskimos did their utmost, and our bold 
sailor-boys, were not one step behind. Even 
Captain B. Mute Rogers, and myself (Cap¬ 
tain Hall was a rather large, dignified-looking 
man and a New England Puritan), had to join 
in the dizzy whirl. I was positively forced into 
it. One and all insisted on my ‘treading the 
light fantastic toe.’ My hands were placed in 
those of two Eskimo ladies; and I was fairly 
dragged into the dance; and dance I did! Yes, 
I danced; that is, I went through certain motions 
which in courtesy to me was called dancing, but 


96 


FURTHER ADVENTURES 


what would the belles of Boston have said of it? 
I blush to think. However it so happened that 
nobody was hurt> except a few of the Holstein- 
bory maidens on whose feet I had rather clum¬ 
sily trod and who went away limping, with re¬ 
marks. As for the dancing let me honestly con¬ 
fess that I felt the better for it. I am sure that 
many evils in my nature found a way out at my 
feet.” 

After Melville Bay had been safely navi¬ 
gated, the Polaris experienced her first contact 
with the ice off Hakluyt Island. Smith Sound 
and Kennedy Channel were navigated without 
any serious trouble, and the highest point in the 
voyage was then reached, 82° 11' N., up to that 
time the highest north latitude ever touched. 
It was not possible, however, to maintain this 
position, for the swift current carried the vessel 
with it, and protection from the fog and snow 
had to be sought by anchoring the Polaris to a 
large ice-floe. 

In the steady drift southward Captain Hall 
observed a small bay, which he was desirous of 
exploring in the hope that it might afford some 
shelter; but though he twice made the attempt, 
he did not succeed, and in commemoration of his 
double defeat he named it Repulse Harbor. 

It was only by exercising the greatest care 
that the Polaris was kept free from damage dur- 


FURTHER ADVENTURES 


97 


ing these days of constant struggle with the ice. 
The sailing-master urged Captain Hall to seek 
a harbor at once and go into winter quarters; 
but he was still hopeful of working farther to 
the north. He did not want to abandon any 
chance that might be found of reaching a higher 
latitude before being compelled to seek quarters 
for the winter. To consider the situation he 
called a council of his officers. The opinion was 
unanimous among them that it was impossible 
to advance to the north along the eastern side of 
the channel. It would, therefore, be necessary 
either to seek a harbor on the east coast, or to 
attempt a passage to the westward. The latter 
of these courses was adopted by Hall in the hope 
that opportunities for sledge traveling might be 
afforded. If defeated in this plan, he would 
seek a harbor on the eastern coast. 

It was with the greatest difficulty that the ship 
was able to move at all, for on every side were 
huge floes, to one of which the Polaris had to be 
secured. On the morning of September 1st, 
heavy snow squalls added to the difficulties of 
the situation; and as the ice, forced by the wind, 
pressed closer and closer upon the ship, there 
was every prospect of its being crushed to pieces. 
Realizing the danger, the captain ordered his 
men to be in readiness to leave the vessel at a 
moment’s notice. 


98 FURTHER ADVENTURES 


As the pressure increased, the Polaris heeled 
over, and was almost forced upon the surface of 
the ice. A catastrophe seeming imminent, the 
stores and provisions were quickly removed from 
the hold and placed upon the deck in prepara¬ 
tion for a hurried retreat. On the morning of 
the 2nd of September the outlook was even 
darker. There seemed no possibility of escaping 
from the gigantic floes that surrounded the ship, 
and her destruction was hourly expected. Pro¬ 
visions and coal were lowered on to the ice, so 
that in the event of the crew having to abandon 
the Polaris , they would have a supply of neces¬ 
saries for the winter. 

Calling the men together, Captain Hall spoke 
with satisfaction of what had already been ac¬ 
complished. They had done all that they could, 
he said, and had only given in to a force that it 
was impossible to resist. But the brave leader 
was not without hope. He still believed that there 
was no reason to doubt the accomplishment of 
their object—the reaching of the Pole—though 
he could not conceal from his men the danger 
of their position. 

As the day advanced the weather showed signs 
of improvement, and the stores that had been 
placed upon the floe were taken back to the ship. 
Having cast off from the ice, the vessel pro¬ 
ceeded under steam towards the eastern shore, 


FURTHER ADVENTURES 


99 


soon reaching water that was comparatively 
free from obstruction, and ultimately anchoring 
in a harbor. 

Being anxious to make a sledge journey be¬ 
fore the winter set in, Hall announced his inten¬ 
tion of proceeding on an exploring expedition 
to determine how far north the land extended 
on the east side of the strait on which the Polaris 
was wintering. He wished also to prospect for 
a feasible inland route to the northwest for 
sledging in the following spring, when an at¬ 
tempt would be made to reach the Pole. 

With two sledges, and accompanied by three 
of his men, Captain Hall set out on this journey 
and penetrated as far north as Cape Brevoort, 
where he deposited a record of what had been 
accomplished. “From the top of an iceberg,” 
wrote the commander, “we could see a bay, which 
extended to the high land eastward to south¬ 
ward of the position about fifteen miles. On 
arriving at the mouth of the bay we found open 
water, having numerous seals in it bobbing up 
their heads. This open water debars all possible 
chance of extending our journey on the ice up 
the strait; and the mountainous character of the 
land will not admit of our sledging farther north. 
As the time of our expected absence was under¬ 
stood to be for two weeks, we commence our re¬ 
turn journey to-morrow morning. 


> 


> 


100 FURTHER ADVENTURES 


On the following day the journey back to the 
ship was begun. It was the gallant captain’s 
last trip of exploration, little as he suspected it 
at the time. 

Soon after reaching the Polaris , Hall became 
very sick after drinking a cup of coffee. Dr. 
Bessels was considerably alarmed when he ex¬ 
amined the patient, whose condition for the next 
few days gave rise to the gravest fears. On the 
28th the commander was much worse. His mind 
began to wander; he refused to take medicine, 
and did not recognize those around him. He 
revived a little during the following week; but 
on the morning of November 7 he sank into a 
state of unconsciousness, and passed quietly 
away early the next day, his last words being to 
Dr. Bessels, whom he thanked for his kindness 
to him. He was buried on shore two days after¬ 
wards. Owing to the great darkness, the little 
procession of mourners that accompanied the 
body to its last resting-place had to pick their 
way over the ice with the aid of lanterns, although 
it was near the middle of the day. 

The command of the expedition devolved 
upon Captain Budington; but so far as the main 
object of the enterprise was concerned it was 
practically at an end, the death of Hall having 
proved fatal to farther advance. The winter 
passed without mishap, though for most of the 


FURTHER ADVENTURES 101 

* 

time the vessel, under the ice-pressure, lay on an 
uneven keel, thus rendering motion on the decks 
or sleeping in the berths very uncomfortable. 1 

In the spring of 1872 several sledging expedi¬ 
tions were carried out; and the coast was ex¬ 
plored as far south as Cape Bryan. In June 
boat journeys were made to the northward, but 
the voyagers did not get beyond Cape Sumner. 

Determining to return home, Captain Bud- 
ington guided the Polaris out of her winter har¬ 
bor; but the trials of the expedition were only 
now beginning. At the mouth of Kennedy 
Channel, the ship was beset by ice in the month 
of August; and for two long weary months, full 
of fears and dangers, each day appearing to put 
farther away the prospect of release, the ship 
drifted with the ice. At last, as the only chance 
of life, it was decided to abandon her; and to¬ 
wards the middle of October the final prepara¬ 
tions were made for taking to the ice. 

“The Polaris was drifting along at a rapid 
rate,” says the official story. “Eager faces 
looked over the rail and peered into the dark¬ 
ness, wondering what would happen next. The 
sky was threatening. The moon struggled in 
vain to break through the clouds. Two icebergs 
were passed in close proximity. One could 
scarcely help shuddering at the thought of run¬ 
ning into one of these gigantic ice-mountains. 


102 FURTHER ADVENTURES 


“At 7:30 the vessel ran among some icebergs; 

at the same time the pack closed up, jamming 

her heavily. It was then the vessel received her 
* 

severest nip. She shook and trembled. She 
was raised up bodily and thrown over on her 
port side. Her timbers cracked with loud re¬ 
ports. The sides seemed to be breaking in. One 
of the firemen, hurrying on deck, reported that 
a piece of ice had been driven through the sides. 
Escape from destruction seemed to be impossi¬ 
ble. The pressure and the noise increased to¬ 
gether. The violence of the storm, the dark¬ 
ness of the night, and the grinding of the ice 
added to the horror of the situation.” 

Amid these terrifying conditions, Captain 
Budington, despairing of finding further safety 
on the vessel, gave orders for the stores and pro¬ 
visions to be thrown upon the ice. Realizing 
the critical situation and the necessity for speedy 
action, the men exerted themselves to the very 
utmost, and performed feats of strength that 
would not have been possible under ordinary 
circumstances. Beds and bedding were next 
transferred to the floe; and three boats were 
lowered and placed upon the ice. This happened 
on October 15, within sight of Northumber¬ 
land Island. 

When night came on, the gale was still blow¬ 
ing with terrific force; and, almost before any 





“GOOD-BYE, POLARIS!” 



























































































. 


Ill in 11 e 



FURTHER ADVENTURES 103 

one realized what was happening, the vessel sud¬ 
denly broke from the ice and was carried rapidly 
away from it, leaving upon the floe nineteen 
persons, including several Eskimos. The night 
was dark, and in a few moments the floe, with its 
freight of human souls, disappeared from view; 
but across the blackness came the sound - of a 
voice shouting, “Good-bye, Polaris! 

The tragedy had fallen so swiftly that those 
on hoard the vessel could scarcely realize what 
had happened. For a few moments they could 
only stand in amazed silence. But soon their 
own condition called for action, for the Polaris 
was by this time leaking very badly, and the men 
were put to the pumps with orders to work for 
their lives. The water had already reached the 
floor of the fire-room. Had it not been checked 
just in time by the action of the pumps, it would 
in a few minutes more have extinguished the fire 
itself; and here, in all probability, would have 
ended the story of one section of Hall’s expedi¬ 
tion. 

Drifting rapidly till midnight, the Polaris 
then ran into broken ice, which stayed her prog¬ 
ress; and on the following day she was success¬ 
fully beached in Life Boat Cove, where the win¬ 
ter was passed. As it was no longer possible to 
remain on the ship, houses were built on shore. 

When the summer came round, another at- 


104 FURTHER ADVENTURES 


tempt was made to get away from the desolate 
regions of ice and cold. The Polaris , no longer 
of any service to the expedition, was finally aban¬ 
doned in June, 1873, when in two boats, built 
under the direction of one of the officers, the 
party turned their backs on Life Boat Cove, 
and made one more attempt at escape. 

Another series of hazardous adventures now 
began. Their old enemy the ice still resisted 
their progress to the south, and threatened them 
again and again with disaster. When they were 
crossing Whale Sound the ice suddenly closed, 
pressing heavily against Captain Budington’s 
boat, and only the prompt action of the crew in 
leaping upon a floe and dragging their boat after 
them prevented its being crushed. The cake of 
ice on which they had taken refuge was not more 
than twice the size of the boat itself, and there 
a night of terror was passed. 

Frequent experiences of this sort occurred 
before they were finally out of danger. On 
June 23rd, the whaling-vessel Ravenscraig , 
from Kirkcaldy, Scotland, was sighted. Once 
on board this hospitable vessel, their long period 
of suffering was over, and the little band of ex¬ 
plorers were safe at last. 

As for the party left on the ice floe, it is not 
easy to imagine their consternation when the gale 
drove the Polaris away from them. When that 


FURTHER ADVENTURES 105 


calamity happened, most of the men were en¬ 
gaged in arranging into some sort of order the 
stores and provisions that had been hastily 
thrown upon the ice. Some of the provisions 
were lost when the ice parted, and the night was 
too dark and stormy to risk life in going after 
them. 

The next day several of the men took to the 
boats, with the intention of reaching the shore 
and obtaining the assistance of the Eskimos liv¬ 
ing in the neighborhood in procuring food and 
shelter for the party. But it was found impos¬ 
sible to make any headway through the broken 
ice; and the attempt had to be abandoned. 

It seemed, however, as if relief would reach 
them from another quarter; for, soon after this 
disappointment, the Polaris was seen rounding 
a point eight or ten miles distant, under steam 
and sails. Signals were immediately raised, and 
hope ran high. Surely their comrades on board 
would see them and come to the rescue. Strain¬ 
ing their eyes, they followed the movements of 
the vessel from which they had so recently parted, 
anxiously watching for any sign that they had 
been observed. But the ship passed out of sight; 
and they were left to do battle with hunger and 
cold, and to face the horrors of an Arctic winter. 

The weather, which hitherto had been thick, 
with heavy snow-showers, cleared up. It was 


106 FURTHER ADVENTURES 


then seen that the floe was entirely surrounded 
by water, and that it was drifting southward. 
By the end of the month, the effects of exposure 
and the want of food began to show themselves. 
Some of the men were scarcely able to stand. 
Had it not been for the skill of the two Eskimos, 
Joe and Hans, in hunting seals, the entire party 
must have perished. Again and again the timely 
arrival of a seal saved the starving band from 
death, and sometimes, in their haste to satisfy 
the cravings of hunger, the seal was eaten un¬ 
cooked. 

Nearly three months dragged wearily by. The 
first day of the new year (1873) was the coldest 
they had yet experienced on the floe; and all the 
party were in a condition of extreme weakness, 
owing to the lack of food. These dismal condi¬ 
tions were little altered during the month. 

February came in with a great gale, which 
lasted for several days. On the 21st of that 
month, for the first time since the beginning of 
the year, the thermometer rose above zero. But 
the supply of food was still woefully short, and 
in order that it might last till April, the daily 
rations were reduced to seven ounces. Even 
this limited supply had to be lessened soon after¬ 
wards to the very smallest quantity upon which 
life could be sustained. 

By the 1st of April the floe had wasted to such 


FURTHER ADVENTURES 107 


an extent that it was no longer safe. The party 
thereupon took to their boat, nineteen persons 
crowding into a tiny craft that had been con¬ 
structed to carry less than half that number. 
At first the boat lay too deep in the water, and 
a hundred pounds of meat, and nearly all the 
clothing, had to be thrown overboard. 

For a month this little company, that had 
passed through so many hardships, braved the 
dangers of the deep in their frail boat. The fre¬ 
quent pressure of the ice necessitated repeated 
landings on the floes; and sometimes it was only 
after considerable difficulty that the landing was 
effected, and the boat dragged up out of the 
water. 

On the 19th the party again sought shelter on 
the drifting ice. That night a heavy sea washed 
over them, carrying away everything that was 
loose, including the tent and most of the cloth¬ 
ing. It seemed as if the boat would be the next 
to go, and if that happened all possibility of es¬ 
cape would be gone. It was necessary, there¬ 
fore, to make a great effort to prevent such a 
catastrophe. Standing round the boat, the men 
held on with all their might, remaining in this 
attitude all through the night until seven o’clock 
in the morning, doing battle with the angry 
waves, and receiving severe bruises from the 
blocks of ice that were hurled against them out 


108 FURTHER ADVENTURES 


of the raging sea. Grimly they held on, know¬ 
ing well that any slackening of effort would 
mean destruction. It was a struggle of heroes; 
and they fought in silence, which was broken 
only by brief words of encouragement to each 
other as they stuck to their posts. 

The next few days brought but little relief. 
Everybody was cold and hungry; but they were 
drifting nearer to the track of vessels, and a new 
hope was bearing them up. 

During the afternoon of the 27th a steamer 
was sighted, and as she appeared to be bearing 
down upon the castaways their hearts thrilled 
with joy. But the joy was short-lived. The 
steamer failed to see them, and passing from 
view, left the sufferers in despair. 

Two days later they had to endure another 
disappointment; a steamer appeared in sight 
about eight miles off, but proceeded on her way 
without observing them. The next day, how¬ 
ever, brought the long-hoped-for relief. In the 
morning a steamer was seen close to the floe, 
which was then off the coast of Labrador. She 
proved to be the sealer Tigress, from New¬ 
foundland; and from Captain Bartlett and his 
crew the shipwrecked party received every kind¬ 
ness. 

Thus was brought to a happy ending the long 
and terrible struggle that had lasted for one hun- 


FURTHER ADVENTURES 


109 


dred and ninety-six days, eighty-three of which 
were without the sun, and during which they 
had drifted 1500 miles. 

The Polaris expedition had not reached the 
Pole, but the voyage was fruitful in geographi¬ 
cal results; and the fact that both sections of the 
crew, after months of hardship, had come hack 
alive, more than outweighed the disappointment 
at the failure of the main object of the enter¬ 
prise. 


X 


THE “JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 

E ACH failure to reach the Pole only 
seemed to lend stimulus to further ef¬ 
fort, and to intensify the desire to break 
through the barrier of ice that blocked the way 
to the great secret of the North. 

Lieutenant George Washington De Long, 
of the United States Navy, was the next to 
make the attempt on behalf of America. He 
had carefully studied the conditions prevailing 
in the Arctic regions, and had formed the opin¬ 
ion that there were three routes by which a 
successful effort might be made to reach the 
Pole—Smith Sound, the east coast of Green¬ 
land, and Behring Strait. He selected the last, 
believing in the existence of a Japanese current 
running north through Behring Strait and on¬ 
wards along the east coast of Wrangel Land. 
The warm water of this current, he argued, 
would open a way along the coast of Wrangel 
Land, possibly to the Pole itself; and as whal- 
in<r vessels locked in the ice there had drifted 
northwards, he concluded that the current set 
in that direction. 

Supported in his enterprise by private funds, 

( 110 ) 



“JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 111 


De Long spent some time in a quest for the 
right kind of vessel, purchasing at last from Sir 
Allen Young his Arctic yacht Pandora and 
changing her name to the Jeannette . Well 
equipped for her purpose, the Jeannette sailed 
from San Francisco in July, 1879. Steaming 
her way northwards towards Wrangel Land, 
she found herself, by the beginning of Septem¬ 
ber, among the drifting ice-floes. 

Watching his opportunity, De Long steered 
his ship into the ice-pack, thus boldly putting 
to the test his theories with regard to the drift 
which he believed would carry him to his goal. 
For a few days he sailed through the floating 
mass, and then the ice closed around him. The 
Jeannette was locked in a frozen prison, to re¬ 
main there until, two years later, she was 
crushed between the floes, leaving the men who 
had shared her fortunes homeless on the ice. 

The winter set in rapidly. On November 
14th the sun disappeared from view, and was 
not again seen till the end of January, the whole 
of which month was full of danger to the Jean¬ 
nette. 

Threatened by the great masses of grinding 
ice, rising in some places to a height of fifty 
feet, which enclosed her on every side, the ves¬ 
sel seemed doomed; and it looked as if she 
would have to be abandoned. But the danger 



112 “JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 


passed for a time; and, remaining in her frozen 
prison, she drifted with the ice till the shore of 
Wrangel Land, which had up to that time been 
visible, disappeared from view towards the end 
of February. 

The summer came and went, and still the 
explorers were surrounded by icy walls which 
offered no way of escape. The life of inactivity 
was beginning to tell upon the spirits of the 
men, and even De Long himself was discour¬ 
aged by the long imprisonment. Already they 
had spent a trying year in the grip of the floes; 
and, as another winter was rapidly approaching, 
the prospect of liberation was as far off as ever. 
Soon the long night of darkness fell once more 
upon the disheartened party; and they waited, 
with what patience they could, for the return 
of the daylight. 

The steady drift northwards brought the 
Jeannette at last within sight of land. On May 
16, 1881, to the great relief of all on board, 
an island was seen in the distance, to which De 
Long gave the name of Jeannette Island. 
Eight days later land was again seen, and a 
party, going off from the ship to investigate it, 
named it Henrietta Island. 

About the beginning of June the ice began 
to press more severely than ever upon the ves¬ 
sel, causing the timbers to crack and the seams 


“JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 113 


to open. Every one on board was convinced 
that the chances of the Jeannette holding to¬ 
gether were slight indeed. De Long and his 
comrades were considering what was best to do, 
whether to leave the ship or to remain on her 
in the hope of the pressure lessening, when the 
moving floes bore down upon her, and made 
instant action imperative. The ice was split¬ 
ting up, and, jammed between huge masses, 
the Jeannette lay in a hopeless position. 

It was on the 12th of June that orders were 
given to abandon the ship. There was no 
panic, for such a possibility had long been fore¬ 
seen. Every man knew his duty, and set about 
performing it. The colors were hoisted to the 
mast-head, and boats, sledges, and provisions 
were lowered on to the ice. The ship heeled 
over, even while this work was being carried 
out, until it became impossible to stand on deck 
without holding on to something. At last, 
when all the indispensable articles had been 
transferred, De Long followed his men on to 
the ice. He was the last to leave; and waving 
his cap and crying, “Good-bye, old ship!” he 
leaped on to the floe to join his companions. 

Deprived of the shelter of the Jeannette, it 
was not a cheering prospect that faced the 
stout-hearted band. They were five hundred 
miles from the mouth of the Lena River, the 


114 “JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 


nearest point of relief; some of the men were 
ill, and the food supply was dangerously low. 
They at once set about preparing a camp, and 
then lay down to sleep and to forget the 
troubles of the day just ended. 

A few hours later, they were awakened by a 
noise like thunder. The giant floe had split. 
One crack came directly through De Longs 
tent; and “had it not been for the weight of 
the sleepers on either side of the rubber- 
blanket,” Melville tells us, “those in the middle 
must inevitably have dropped into the sea. As 
it was they were rescued with great difficulty. 

“Although the boats, sleds, and provisions 
had been placed close to the tents to avoid sep¬ 
aration by just such an accident as this, we now 
found ourselves driven away from them. 
Boards were at once thrown across the crack, 
nimble feet sped back and forth, the sleds and 
boats were successfully jumped over, and when 
the gap had widened beyond the length of the 
planks a way was discovered around it. The 
provisions recovered, our tents were quickly 
shifted back from the edge of the floe, and we 
were soon dozing again in our sleeping bags. 

When the camp awoke there was no ship. 
The Jeannette had sunk about four o’clock in 
the morning; and there, upon the cruel ice, 
stood the gallant band, about to begin the des- 


“JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 115 


perate fight that for most of them was to end 
in death. But they faced the unknown with a 
smile upon their faces and with hope in their 
hearts. 

A week was spent in preparation; and then 
began the long and trying journey towards the 
south. It was hard dragging the overladen 
sledges over the sodden snow that soaked the 
men as they marched; but they could not risk 
leaving anything behind. 

The load consisted of two cutters, a whale¬ 
boat, the sledges laden with tents, and provi¬ 
sions to last for sixty days. Owing to the heavy 
hauling it was necessary to travel the same road 
several times. Frequently the sledges sank in 
the soft snow and broken ice, and only by com¬ 
bined effort could they be extricated. 

With the view of lessening the difficulties of 
the march, the travelling was performed by 
night instead of by day, in the hope that the 
track, in the absence of the sun’s rays, would 
be firmer, and therefore easier to traverse. 

In spite of the hardships of the journey, the 
men pulled with wonderful cheerfulness; and 
although they wore the soles of their moccasins 
right through to their stockings, and sometimes 
stood with bare feet on the raw ice, not a word 
of complaint passed their lips. 

These were not by any means the only dis- 


116 “JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 


couragements that had to be faced. Every day 
had its own peculiar trials and disappoint¬ 
ments. One day De Long made the startling 
discovery, that although they had for the pre¬ 
ceding week been traveling steadily towards the 
south, they were actually twenty-eight miles 
farther to the north than when they started. 
This proved conclusively that the ice was bear¬ 
ing them to the north at a greater rate than they 
were able to travel in the opposite direction. 
A change of course from south to south-west 
was, therefore, immediately decided upon. 
About a w'eek later De Long learned from an¬ 
other observation that the alteration of route 
had been successful, that they had gained 
twenty-one miles, and were approaching nearer 
to the shores of Siberia. 

Land and water were sighted in July. The 
party landed on wdiat proved to be an island, 
which was named Bennett Island. The ex¬ 
plorers remained there until the boats were re¬ 
paired, and then once more resumed their weary 
and perilous journey. 

Their next landing was on one of the New 
Siberian Islands, where a camp was pitched on 
a mossy plain close to the shore. Again they 
left land behind and embarked on the water, 
De Long commanding one of the cutters and 


“JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 117 


Lieutenant Chipp the other, while Chief Engi¬ 
neer Melville had charge of the whale-boat. 

L T p to a certain stage the dangers and diffi¬ 
culties of the journey had been confined to the 
snow and ice; now these were transferred to 
the water, a change that did not make for in¬ 
creased comfort or safety. The cutter contain¬ 
ing Chipp and his men, being smaller and 
slower than the other two boats, was soon left 
in the rear; but it again joined the others, just 
as their companions, who had waited for them 
on an ice floe, were beginning to fear that they 
had been lost in the gale. 

The brave party fought their way along, 
sitting all the while in cramped positions and 
bailing the water out of the boats to keep them 
from sinking. Dodging the sharp edges of the 
ice as best they could, and taking advantage of 
every opening in the floes, the three boats made 
fair progress. 

The weather was still very stormy, and it 
w r as evident that with such a wind blowing it 
would not be safe for the boats to risk crossing 
the open sea between the islands and the coast 
of Siberia, if the sledges were retained on 
board. Accordingly De Long directed that 
they should be broken up for firewood, and the 
pieces stowed in the boats. 

Shut in for some days by the drifting ice- 


118 “JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 


pack, which prevented advance by water, the 
explorers found themselves in a serious situa¬ 
tion. Not only was the winter closing in 
around them, but the provisions were nearing 
an end; and the islands which lay ahead were 
without inhabitants. De Long, Chipp, and 
Melville discussed the situation, and decided 
that they would proceed from point to point 
along the south side of the islands of New Si¬ 
beria until they reached Cape Barkin at the 
Lena Delta, where, according to their charts, 
they confidently expected to find native houses. 

Once more in their boats, they proceeded on 
their journey, the sea running high and the 
waves constantly lashing over them; at one time 
in clear water, at another in the midst of a 
whirling mass of broken ice; sometimes pulling 
for their lives to escape destruction from the 
floe; and all the time on an allowance of food 
that barely sufficed to keep life in their bodies. 

It was by this time almost the middle of Sep¬ 
tember, and hope was beginning to return, as 
Cape Barkin, the point which they desired to 
reach, was now less than ninety miles distant. 

Just before re-entering the boats, after a 
brief halt, De Long asked Chipp and Melville 
to keep within hail, if possible; and he repeated 
his instructions as to the course to be pursued 
should they be separated. “Make the best of 



SIGNALLED HER TO GO ON 









“JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 119 


your way,” he said, “to Cape Barkin. Don’t 
wait for me, but get a pilot from the natives 
and proceed up the river to a place of safety; 
and be sure that you and your parties are all 
right before you trouble yourselves about me.” 

The boats had not been long on their way 
before the sea rose considerably, and by evening 
there was such a hurricane blowing that it 
seemed impossible to live through it. Attempt¬ 
ing to slacken speed and thus keep in the wake 
of the first cutter, according to orders, the 
whale-boat narrowly escaped being swamped. 
Melville noticed that De Long was making 
signs to him, and shouting something which 
could not be heard above the roar of the wind. 
Shouting to his commander that he must either 
run or swamp, Melville eagerly waited for some 
sign of reply. His words seemed to reach De 
Long, who, realizing the imminent peril of the 
whale-boat, waved his arm and signalled her 
to go on. Under additional sail the whale-boat 
then leaped forward, and speedily outdistanced 
the first cutter. 

Looking back to ascertain the whereabouts 
of the cutters, Melville saw Chipp’s boat, in the 
far-off dim twilight, rise for a moment on the 
crest of a wave and then sink out of sight. 
Keeping his eye on the place where he saw her 
disappear, he anxiously waited to see her come 


120 “JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 


again to the surface; but though the waves rose 
and fell around the spot, the boat was not seen 
again. As nothing further was ever learned 
about the cutter’s fate, Melville was convinced 
that that was the moment when she took her 
final plunge, burying beneath the waves the 
Lieutenant and his men. 

Meanwhile, De Long’s cutter was being kept 
afloat with the greatest difficulty. Much 
water was shipped; the mast and sail were car¬ 
ried away; and, tossed about on the tempestu¬ 
ous sea, the helpless boat was in momentary 
danger of sinking. At last, after four days of 
awful misery, every minute of which threatened 
death, the cutter came within sight of land, and, 
when about a mile from the Siberian shore, ran 
aground. A raft was hastily constructed; and 
pushing it through the frozen water, the wet 
and exhausted men gradually reached the land. 

They had escaped the terrors and dangers of 
the sea; but the dangers of the land, as grim 
and terrible as any yet experienced, had to be 
faced. LTtterly worn out, they lay down on 
the ground to sleep, and rose in the morning, 
soaked to the skin, to meet the miseries of cold 
and hunger. 

Leaving everything behind that could pos¬ 
sibly be spared, they set out in search of a settle¬ 
ment where they could find shelter and food. 


“JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 121 


It was a pitiable procession. There was not 
one strong man in the company; for the long 
battle on the floes and on the sea, combined 
with the want of food, had drained their 
strength till they could scarcely crawl. Slowly 
and feebly they pushed on over the barren 
ground. They had little to eat, and already 
some of the party were falling down from 
weakness. 

Reaching a couple of deserted huts, they 
rested there for three days; and then, feeling 
slightly refreshed, they resumed their toilsome 
march. On they tramped till not a scrap of food 
remained; and, in desperation, their dog was 
shot to provide them with a meal. Completely 
exhausted, one man died; and his companions, 
too weak to bury him, dropped him into a river. 
Seeing the terrible state of their comrades, two 
of the men, Nindemann and Noros, started off 
ahead in the hope of finding help. 

It was now the middle of October, and 
winter, with all its terrors, held the despairing 
men in its fatal grip. There was nothing to 
eat, and, unable to continue the struggle, they 
sat down to wait the end. One by one the little 
party, that had undergone so many hardships 
and had fought so hard for their lives, were 

overcome and lay down to die. 

So long as he was able to hold a pen, De 


122 “JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 


Long noted in his journal the deaths of his 
companions, the last entry being on October 
30th. There the tragic story ends. On the 
frozen ground lay the bodies of the brave com¬ 
mander and his men. Like so many others be¬ 
fore them, they had hoped to conquer the se¬ 
crets of the Frozen North; but where they 
looked for victory and honor, they found defeat 
and death. 

Little more remains to be added with regard 
to the fate of the Jeannette Expedition. After 
many buffetings by wind and waves, the whale¬ 
boat succeeded in reaching land, without a man 
missing; and falling in with some natives, Mel¬ 
ville and his men were kindly treated. 

Nindemann and Noros, pushing on from De 
Long’s party, were reduced to terrible straits 
before they had gone far on their journey. 

Coming to a deserted hut, they found a small 
quantity of mouldy fish. This they ate, and 
were afterwards taken seriously ill. In their 
extremity they met an Eskimo, who brought 
them to his friends. They tried to make the 
natives understand that they wanted help for 
their comrades, but all their efforts in this di¬ 
rection failed. 

At a larger settlement, called Baiun, to 
which the Eskimos escorted them, they came 
across Melville, who, hearing of their arrival, 


“JEANNETTE” EXPEDITION 128 

had hastened to meet them. Melville heroically 
attempted to go back on the tracks of Ninde- 
mann and Noros, hoping that he might yet be 
in time to save some of De Long s party; but 
the difficulties that beset his path rendered the 
attempt unsuccessful. 

A little later, Melville and Nindemann made 
their way back to the spot at which death had 
overtaken their companions. They found the 
bodies, and buried them; but they were not per¬ 
mitted to lie long in their lonely Northern 
grave, being soon afterwards brought back to 
America for interment; and here belated hon¬ 
ors were paid to the memory of the heroic band. 


XI 


GREELY SETS A NEW NORTHERN 

MARK 

W HILE De Long and his men were bat¬ 
tling with the ice-floes, another expedi¬ 
tion from the United States, under 
Lieutenant Adolphus W. Greely, was on its way 
towards the Pole. 

In July, 1881 the steamer Proteus chartered 
for the expedition, left St. John’s, Newfound¬ 
land, and safely reached Lady Franklin Bay, 
in Grinnell Land. In its progress northward 
the expedition experienced little opposition 
from the ice; but the landing in Discovery Har¬ 
bor was barred by a great frozen wall, which 
the Proteus, attacking with her iron prow, grad¬ 
ually broke down. A site for a house was soon 
chosen, and to the station Greely gave the name 
of Fort Conger, in honor of the American sen¬ 
ator to whose efforts the expedition was chiefly 
due. 

After landing the stores and equipment, the 
Proteus steamed southward, fighting her way 
out of the ice-blocked harbor after several un¬ 
successful attempts to break through the ice 
obstructing her path. She was to return in the 

( 124 ) 


GREELY S NORTHERN MARK 125 


following summer with fresh supplies, so that 
the farewell, it was thought, was but for a short 
time. 

With the ship’s departure the expedition set¬ 
tled down to it’s winter’s work. The sun disap¬ 
peared on October 14, leaving the explorers 
in the intense and prolonged darkness of the 
Arctic winter. A semi-monthly newspaper. 
The Arctic Moon, edited by Lieutenant Lock- 
wood, was prepared with the view of providing 
some little amusement and diversion; but it 
seems to have only partially succeeded in its 
praiseworthy object, for it ceased after two 
months. In January the camp was visited by a 
violent storm, which threatened to demolish the 
house; but its protecting snow-banks offered a 
firm resistance to the hurricane, and prevented 
the catastrophe which, with the gale blowing at 
a velocity of sixty-five miles an hour, seemed 
inevitable. 

The return of daylight, about the end of Feb- 
ruary, was the signal for the commencement of 
the sledging expeditions. It had been Greely’s 
original intention to perform the greater part 
of this work with dogs, of which three teams 
had been purchased in Greenland. But of the 
twenty-seven animals shipped only twelve were 
still alive. 

Early in the season. Dr. Pavy, the surgeon 


126 GREELY’S NORTHERN MARK 


of the expedition, made a sledge journey along 
the eastern coast of Grinnell Land to its ex¬ 
treme northern point, near Cape J oseph 
Henry. Other parties worked in the interior, 
discovering abundant deposits of coal within a 
few miles of the station. In April, Lieuten¬ 
ant Lockwood and other members of the party 
crossed Robeson Channel to the Greenland 
coast, reaching on May 5th, 83° 24' 5" N., the 
farthest north hitherto attained by man. 

These journeys were not conducted without 
the usual accompaniment of danger and adven¬ 
ture. Pavy had to struggle against the diffi¬ 
culties of broken hummocky floes and open 
water; while Lockwood and his companions en¬ 
countered a terrific gale in Robeson Channel, 
and for two days had to remain in the shelter of 
their sleeping bags, being unable during that 
time to do any cooking owing to the tremendous 
force of the storm. At one point the wind was 
so powerful that it lifted the dog-sledge, with 
its 200-pound load, high into the air; and, as 
the tents could not be pitched, the men made 
themselves as comfortable as was possible 
under the trying circumstances by burrowing 
into the snow. 

In spite of these and other drawbacks, the 
brave little party pushed northward till they 
had advanced four miles nearer to the Pole than 


GREELY’S NORTHERN MARK 127 


any previous expedition. Here the Stars and 
Stripes were proudly hoisted. 

The summer came and went without any sign 
of the Proteus with the needful supply of pro¬ 
visions. Winter was again approaching, and 
the explorers settled down to face it with what 
patience and courage they could command. It 
was obvious, as Greely said, that the second 
winter could hardly pass as pleasantly as the 
first. “The novelty of Arctic service had 
passed, while the unvarying routine and weari¬ 
some monotony could not hut depress the spirits 
of the men. The non-arrival of the Proteus 
not only threw a gloom over the party, hut it 
necessitated a restriction in the use of certain 
articles of food.” 

The winter passed uneventfully. There was 
little to do at the station; hut Greely’s active 
mind reflected on the course to be adopted 
should the Proteus, for the second time, fail 
them. It was not a pleasant subject to think 
about; hut he could not close his eyes to the 
fact that wdiat had happened once might hap¬ 
pen again; and it was possible that the coming 
summer would still find them without the 
needed relief. So he mapped out his course 

and prepared his plans. 

Sledging expeditions were undertaken in the 
spring T and then in the summer occurred, as 


128 GREELYS NORTHERN MARK 


Greely himself describes it, “the only marked 
breach of discipline during our two years at 
Conger.” The unpleasant incident happened 
with the surgeon. “Dr. Pavy,” Greely goes on 
to say, “was an excellent physician, but any re¬ 
straint was irksome to him, and he particularly 
disliked being under authority. As he posi¬ 
tively refused to obey my orders, it became nec¬ 
essary to place him under arrest, with permis¬ 
sion to take such exercise as was necessary, 
within a mile of the station. 5 ’ 

This unfortunate incident is mentioned to 
show that, in addition to the other troubles of 
the party, Greely had to face difficulties from 
which the leaders of other Arctic expeditions 
had been free. 

By the end of July, 1833, everything was in 
readiness for retreat from Fort Conger, and an 
order was issued announcing that the station 
would be abandoned if no vessel should arrive 
before that time. 

Reviewing what had been accomplished dur¬ 
ing their stay there, Greely sums it up in these 
words: “We had experienced two years of un¬ 
equalled cold and darkness, but the amount of 
work done was quite extraordinary. The sun 
had shone 453 days, and on 262 days from one 
to three sledge parties had been in the field on 
journeys entailing from two to six days’ ab- 


GREELY S NORTHERN MARK 129 

sence and 3000 miles of travel. Our explora¬ 
tions covered 3 V3 of latitude and 45 of longi¬ 
tude, one-eighth of the way around the globe 

above the 80tli parallel. 

“To the north a latitude never before at¬ 
tained on land or sea had been reached, and for 
the first time in three centuries Britain yielded 
to another nation the honors of the Farthest 
North. Over a hundred miles of new shore, 
never before trodden by the foot of man, wexe 
added to the coast-line of Greenland. 

“To the westward the Polar Ocean had been 
reached by the crossing of Grinnell Land; 
while the interior of that country had been sur¬ 
veyed, its physical geography determined, and 
the outlines of its north-western coast fixed 

with tolerable certainty.” 

A really admirable record, it must be 
granted, and one of which Greely and the men 
with him had every reason to feel proud. Un¬ 
fortunately, the majority of them did not long 
enjoy the honors they had so hardly won; for 
although dark days had already befallen them, 
darker still lay ahead. 

August found the explorers at Fort Conger 
ready for departure, the relief-ship not having 
arrived; but a gale delayed the start of the 
retreat till the following day. Then the party, 
consisting of twenty-five men in all, abandoned 


130 GREELYS NORTHERN MARK 


the station where for two years they had lived 
together. Turning their faces southwards, they 
hoped that they might fall in with a ship or 
reach Littleton Island, on which a depot had 
been established. 

Cape Baird, at the mouth of Lady Franklin 
Sound, was reached after one day’s journey. 
There a cairn was erected, and in it was de¬ 
posited information with regard to the expedi¬ 
tion and its movements. Stores having been 
taken on board, the journey was resumed, the 
steam-launch having in tow the three other 
boats. They were provided with forty days’ 
rations. 

It was not long before the treacherous ice had 
the .retreating band completely at its mercy, 
blocking the passage that led to safety, and 
retarding their progress when every hour was 
of vital importance. Frequent fogs and snow¬ 
storms soaked the travelers to the skin, as 
they crouched in shivering misery in the open 
boats. It is not necessary to enter into the de¬ 
tails of those terrible days and nights during 
which Greely and his comrades suffered and 
struggled together. Still they set their faces 
southward and continued on. 

The outlook was gradually becoming darker. 
The cold weather was setting in earlier than 
usual; the new ice was already forming, and 


I 


GREELYS NORTHERN MARK 131 

although the commander was keeping his 
thoughts to himself, he had come to the con¬ 
clusion that there would be no more open water 
that year. 

To facilitate their progress over the ice, the 
steam-launch was left behind on the floe, and 
with the sledges heavily laden the brave explor¬ 
ers continued their journey. By the end of 
September the party at last reached the shore, 
landing at Eskimo Point. “The retreat from 
Fort Conger to Cape Sabine,” adds Greely, 
“involved over four hundred miles of travel by 
boat, the greater part of which was made in 
circumstances of such great peril as to test to 
the utmost the courage, coolness, and endur¬ 
ance of any party. It is scant justice to say 
that my officers and men faced resolutely every 
danger, and endured cheerfully every hardship.” 

Preparing to camp at Eskimo Point for the 
winter, Greely estimated that there were ra¬ 
tions to last for thirty-five days, and from 
stores deposited at Cape Sabine and other 
places he hoped to add materially to the supplies. 

Sergeant Rice was despatched to Cape Sa¬ 
bine, and returned, with both good and bad 
news. He reported that at various depots near 
Sabine there were from ten to twelve thousand 
pounds of rations. A record left at Sabine 
explained the reason for the non-return of the 



132 GREELY S NORTHERN MARK 


Proteus . It had been nipped in the ice between 
Cape Sabine and Cape Albert, while attempt¬ 
ing to reach Lady Franklin Bay. “The time,” 
wrote the lieutenant, “was so short that few 
provisions were saved.” The letter added: “All 
saved from the Proteus . The U. S. steamer 
Wantic is on her way to Littleton Island, and a 
Swedish steamer will try to reach Cape York 
during this month. I will endeavor to com¬ 
municate with these vessels at once; and every¬ 
thing within the power of man will be done to 
rescue the brave men at Fort Conger from their 
perilous position.” 

On the receipt of this communication, Greely 
determined to leave their winter quarters at 
Eskimo Point, push on to Cape Sabine, and 
await there the promised help, which he did not 
doubt was already on its way. They had at this 
time four boats, Greely says, and although the 
sun was about to leave them for the winter, they 
could yet travel southwards, there being open 
water visible at Cape Isabella. 

Transferring their camp to the neighborhood 
of Cape Sabine in October, the party built 
houses and settled down in them in good spirits, 
in expectation of a speedy release. But before 
the long-delayed relief found its way to this 
frozen region, nearly all the party had passed 
beyond the reach of help. 


GREELY S NORTHERN MARK 133 


From the very beginning of the stay at Camp 
Clay, as the place was named, the food was 
served out carefully, for it was necessary to 
take every precaution, and so to apportion the 
supplies that they would last till the spring. 
With the view of adding a little to the daily ra¬ 
tions, Greely determined to send a small party 
to Cape Isabella, forty miles to the southward, 
where Nares in 1875 had stored some beef. 

Rice, Frederick, Elison, and Lynn volun¬ 
teered for the task, and reached their destina¬ 
tion after four days’ hard travelling. Ascend¬ 
ing to a height, they gazed southward as far as 
the eye could reach; the brilliant light of the 
moon revealed to their astonished eyes a vast 
stretch of open water, the white-capped waves 
dancing in the moonlight. There, before them, 
lay the path to safety and home. 

Taking up the meat, the four men turned 
their faces towards Camp Clay, tramping 
across the rough ice at a reduced pace because 
of their own feebleness and the additional bur¬ 
den of their sledge. By the time they reached 
the place at which they had last camped on their 
outward journey, Elison was suffering terribly 
from the cold, both hands and feet being badly 
frost-bitten. Each of them taking a hand, 
Frederick and Rice tried to impart some of their 
warmth to the frozen limbs of their companion; 


134 GREELYS NORTHERN MARK 

but there was little alleviation of the pain, and 
in his agony the poor fellow lay crying all night. 

When the march was resumed in the morn¬ 
ing, Elison was but little better; and Freder¬ 
ick, supporting him as he walked, had almost 
to carry him along. All day long they pushed 
slowly ahead. 

Matters reached a crisis the following morn¬ 
ing. Utterly helpless, Elison required more 
than ever the assistance of his comrades; and 
as it was quite impossible to bring him to a 
place of safety and to carry the meat at the 
same time, it was resolved to abandon the food. 
Leaving it, with a rifle stuck in the ice to mark 
the spot, they trudged along with all available 
speed, reaching the old headquarters at Eskimo 
Point after a ten hours’ march. 

By this time Elison was in a pitiable condi¬ 
tion. Not only had his clothing become a sheet 
of ice, but the frost had gone deeper into his 
hands and feet; and when a little heat had been 
obtained, and his frozen limbs began to thaw, 
he suffered terrible agony. 

The next day they were again on the road, 
Elison stumbling and falling in his attempt to 
walk behind the sledge. At last they came to 
a halt at the hill between Baird Inlet and Rosse 
Bay. Elison could no longer stand; and his 
weakened companions were quite unable to haul 


GREELY’S NORTHERN MARK 135 


him up the incline. Something had to be done 
without delay; and Rice boldly set out for 
Camp Clay to bring help, while the other three 
crept into their sleeping-bag, exposed to the 
full fury of a biting gale, to await his return as 
best they could. 

Eating a little frozen beef by the way to 
maintain his strength, Rice manfully faced the 
trying journey to the camp, fifteen weary miles 
away. Across Rice Strait he travelled in the 
darkness, the new ice cracking and bending be¬ 
neath his feet as he walked. 

At midnight Greely was awakened by the 
sound of staggering footsteps, and he sprang 
up to hear from the frozen lips of the exhausted 
traveler that Elison was dying in Rosse Bay. 
Without loss of time Brainard and Christian¬ 
sen, carrying food and brandy to relieve the 
needs of the three men, were hastening over the 
frozen track, followed two hours later by Lieu¬ 
tenant Lockwood, Dr. Pavy, and four of the 
strongest men with the large sledge. 

Meanwhile, things were going badly with the 
men out on the ice. The sleeping-bag froze 
solid in a few hours; and, unable to move, the 
three helpless men lay in one position for eigh¬ 
teen hours. When the relief arrived, they had 
to be cut out of their place of retreat. Camp 
was reached without further mishap, and 


136 GREELY’S NORTHERN MARK 


though Elison’s life was despaired of, he made 
a wonderful recovery. 

Speaking of this journey, Greely says: “The 
half-starved, enfeebled party of eight men 
made a journey of nearly forty miles in forty- 
four hours. They travelled in darkness over 
rough and heavy ice. They had been on re¬ 
duced rations for over two months, and al¬ 
though unfit for the most ordinary service, they 
ventured their lives cheerfully on the barest 
possibility of rescuing a comrade.” 

Existing on a daily ration hardly sufficient to 
support life, Greely and his men passed a mis¬ 
erable winter. To lift, if possible, the thoughts 
of the party from their sufferings, Greely lec¬ 
tured each day upon the physical geography 
and resources of the United States, although 
the effort was a great strain upon him in his ex¬ 
hausted condition. 

The new year (1884) opened without any 
change in the circumstances. In January death 
visited the camp for the first time, one of the 
men succumbing to a severe attack of scurvy. 
In February, Rice and Jens left for Littleton 
Island in the hope of finding a depot with sup¬ 
plies. Most of the party believed that Lieu¬ 
tenant Garlington was there with ample stores 
from the Wantic. In the event of Littleton 
Island yielding no assistance, Rice was to con- 


GREELY S NORTHERN MARK 137 


tinue his journey, and bring help from the Etah 
Eskimos, who had shown much kindness to 
Kane and ITayes. 

After an absence of four days. Rice and Jens 
returned, reporting that they had found open 
water, extending as far into Kane Sea as the 
eye could reach; and that at no time was the 
Greenland shore visible. 

Failure to reach Littleton Island was in¬ 
tensely disappointing to Greely. There was, 
however, just a possibility, he announced, that 
Smith Sound would freeze over by the begin¬ 
ning of March, and give them a chance to es¬ 
cape. But when that time came they were un¬ 
able to leave their camp. “The fates seem to 
be against us,’’ Greely wrote on the 13th; an 
open channel, no food, no hopes from Little¬ 
ton Island. If we were now the strong, active 
men of last autumn, we could cross Smith 
Sound; but we are a party of twenty-four 
starved men, of whom two cannot walk, and 
half-a-dozen cannot haul a pound.” 

The month of April was not far advanced be¬ 
fore it became obvious that the end was in sight. 
The few ounces of food doled out each day did 
practically nothing to stem the ravages of 
hunger. 

As a last desperate chance, Rice and hred- 
erick started out for Baird Inlet with the view 


138 GREELYS NORTHERN MARK 


of recovering the beef deposited there in the 
preceding November, when it was left behind 
owing to the break-down of Elison. 

Realizing the dangerous nature of this under¬ 
taking, Greely had refused his consent when 
it was first suggested by Rice and Frederick; 
but at length he withdrew his opposition, and 
the two men left on their quest at midnight, 
their comrades sending after them a feeble 
cheer to encourage them on their way. 

It was no easy task which the heroic fellows 
had undertaken; but they were prepared to face 
the risks. They were frequently in danger ow¬ 
ing to the deep snow, falling into the drifts, and 
escaping from them only with difficulty. The 
wind swelled into a gale, driving the snow into 
their faces, and making it impossible to light 
a lamp when they encamped the next evening. 
Without tea or drink of any kind, they were 
compelled to take to their sleeping-bag, eating 
only a few ounces of frozen pemmican as they 
lay down on the ice to rest. Soon the drifting 
snow covered them with a mantle of white; and 
the storm continuing, they were unable to leave 
their bag for twenty-two hours. 

Reaching Eskimo Point, they dropped the 
sleeping-bag and some of the rations, and with 
lightened sledge pushed on to the place where 
the meat had been abandoned, now only six 



SITTING IN HIS SHIRT-SLEEVES, HE HELD HIS FRIEND 

IN HIS ARMS 





















































































GREELY’S NORTHERN MARK 139 


miles distant. But again a gale sprang up, and 
the driving snow not only chilled their bodies, 
but obscured their view, so that they stumbled 
on without seeing what lay ahead. Yet they 
manfully persevered till they reached their goal. 
There they searched long and earnestly for the 
meat upon which so much depended; but they 
could not find it, and they turned sadly away 
from the scene of their disappointment. 

They had not gone very far before Rice 
showed signs of collapse. Preparing some 
warm food and drink, Frederick gave it to his 
companion, and then tried to persuade him to 
continue the march to avoid freezing where he 
sat. But all his appeals were in vain. Rice 
could not stand up; and he lay back on the 
sledge to await the end, which appeared to be 
very near. Removing some of his own clothing, 
in spite of the storm of wind and snow, Freder¬ 
ick tenderly wrapped the garments round the 
suffering man; and sitting on the sledge in his 
shirt-sleeves, he held his friend in his arms till 
his eves closed in death. 

Alone on that vast ice-field, chilled with cold 
and weak with hunger, it seemed as if Fred¬ 
erick, too, must lie down in the dazzling snow, 
and follow his comrade into that sleep which 
knows no waking. He was too weary to care 
what happened; and he felt that it would be 


140 GREELYS NORTHERN MARK 


easier to die than to struggle on in wretchedness 
and despair. Rut suddenly there came into his 
mind the thought of the men at Cape Sabine 
eagerly awaiting his return; and rousing him¬ 
self into action, he made his lonely way to 
Eskimo Point, and wearily crept into his sleep¬ 
ing bag. Strengthened somewhat by the rest 
and a little food, he returned next morning to 
the scene of death, and after burying his dead 
comrade in the snow, he began his long march 
back to camp, dragging the sledge after him. 

Throughout this terrible expedition Fred¬ 
erick was conspicuous again and again for his 
courage and loyalty; but nothing so revealed 
the true greatness of the man as his refusal, in 
the face of his own great need and danger, to 
touch one morsel of the food that had been ap¬ 
portioned to his dead comrade. He brought it 
back untouched so that, small as it was, it 
might help to swell the scanty supply on which 
hung the lives of all. 

The month of June was now approaching its 
end. The few who were left were hovering on 
the brink of the grave. It seemed as if the story 
of the ill-fated Franklin Expedition was about 
to be repeated, and that not one man would be 
left to tell the tale of the long days of misery 
and starvation. 

But relief was at hand. Near midnight of 


GREELY S NORTHERN MARK 141 


the 22nd, a sound like that of a steamer’s 
whistle reached Greely’s listening ears, and 
though he could hardly believe that any ship 
would venture along the coast in such a gale as 
was then blowing, he asked Rrainard and Long 
to step outside and see whether anything was 
in sight. Their mission was fruitless; the mo¬ 
mentary spark of hope was extinguished, and 
again the gloom of despair had settled down 
upon them. Suddenly strange voices were 
heard; and the seven survivors knew that at last 
the hour of their deliverance had dawned. 

The expedition, under Captain W. S. Schley, 
commanding the Bear and the Thetis , de¬ 
spatched in search of Greely had found him; 
and the small band that had been snatched from 
the brink of the grave were nursed back to 
health and strength. 


XII 


THE NORTHEAST PASSAGE DIS¬ 
COVERED 

T HE numerous expeditions which had ven¬ 
tured into the Arctic seas had hitherto 
failed to overcome the barrier of ice 
which, like a giant sentinel, guarded the way 
to the Pole; hut they were not by any means 
barren of achievement. Each expedition added 
something to the record of discovery. 

In 1873 a vast archipelago, to which the name 
of Franz Josef Land was given, was discovered 
by an Austro-Hungarian Expedition, under the 
leadership of Payer and Weypreclit. On a 
voyage, in 1872, to discover the Northeast Pass¬ 
age, their ship, the Tegetthoff , was gripped in 
the ice in her endeavor to pass round the north 
end of Novaya Zemlya, and remained fast in 
her prison in spite of all efforts to release her. 
For a year the Tegetthoff was unable to escape, 
and drifted with the pack in darkness, cold and 
solitude. 

Often it seemed as if the ship must be crushed 
to powder, for the ice pressed around her on 
every side till her timbers groaned and cracked. 
On such occasions the men would be summoned 

( 142 ) 


NORTHEAST PASSAGE 


143 


on deck to be ready for any emergency. “Ever 
nearer came the rushing, rattling sounds, as if 
a thousand heavy wagons were being driven 
over rough roads. Close under us the ice be¬ 
gan to tremble and to moan, and as the fury 
of the conflict increased, the shattered portions 
of the floes were rolled up into heaps.” 

On August 30, 1873, occurred the discovery 
which made the voyage memorable. One day 
had been so like another that the monotony of 
life in the icy prison had affected the spirits of 
all; but in an instant the whole scene was 
changed. 

Shrouded in mist, through which the rays of 
the sun occasionally penetrated, the Tegetthoff 
was slowly gliding with the moving mass. Sud¬ 
denly the fog vanished, and there to the aston¬ 
ished gaze of those on deck stood revealed, far 
off in the northwest, “the outlines of bold rocks, 
which in a few minutes seemed to grow into 
a radiant Alpine land.” For a moment the on¬ 
lookers stood transfixed, and then they burst 
into shouts of joy—“Land, land, land at last! 

After all, the expedition had not been a fail¬ 
ure. This land, which had remained unknown 
for thousands of years, had been added to the 
geography of the world. It was named by the 
discoverers Franz Josef Land, in honor of their 
emperor. 


144 


NORTHEAST PASSAGE 


Two visits were made to this new Arctic ter¬ 
ritory in the early days of November; but it 
was not till the following spring that explora¬ 
tions could be conducted. Sledge journeys 
commenced in March and terminated in May, 
450 miles having been surveyed in that time. 

As the Tegetthoff remained firm in the ice, 
it was at last resolved to abandon her, and to 
return to Europe in sledges and boats. So, the 
officers and crew turned their backs on the ves¬ 
sel that had been their home for two years. 

It was a hard, hard struggle to which they 
had committed themselves. Many times it 
seemed as if they would never reach the great 
world beyond with the news of their wonderful 
discovery. 

Travelling was so difficult that the least 
progress filled the weary men with thankful¬ 
ness. Around them the ice lay closely packed; 
and often they had to wait for a week in their 
boats till the mass separated sufficiently to give 
them a passage through. All the time the food 
was diminishing, and as the days went by the 
outlook became darker and darker. 

The difficulties were almost incredible. 
“After the lapse of two months of indescribable 
efforts,” Payer relates, “the distance between 
us and the ship was not much more than a 
couple of miles! All things seemed to say that, 


NORTHEAST PASSAGE 


145 


after our long struggle, there remained for us 
nothing but a return to the ship and a third 
winter there.” 

Fortunately, however, this gloomy prediction 
was not fulfilled. Another month of alternate 
rowing and sledging took them beyond the 
great barrier, where they fell in with a couple 
of Russian schooners. The explorers, after 
ninety-six days in the open air since abandon¬ 
ing their ship, were now free from danger, and 
able to return and tell the story of their great 
discovery. 

The explorations begun by Payer and Wey- 
precht were continued a few years later by B. 
Leigh Smith, who in June, 1881, sailed from 
Peterhead in the Eira, a steamer of 350 tons, 
constructed of extremely hard wood, and speci¬ 
ally adapted for navigation in the ice. 

Still further explorations in Franz Josef 
Land were conducted by the Jackson-Harms- 
worth Expedition in 1894-97. Under the com¬ 
mand of a young Englishman, Frederick G. 
Jackson, the explorers sailed from the Thames 
in July 1894, with the object of making a 
scientific exploration of the land, about which 
very little was yet known. 

Up to this time only some parts of its south¬ 
ern shores had been explored. It seemed rea¬ 
sonable to expect that the archipelago, should 


146 


NORTHEAST PASSAGE 


it be found to stretch far to the north, would 
afford an excellent base from which to extend 
operations to the Pole. 

The hope of reaching the Pole had, however, 
to be abandoned, the land being found to con¬ 
sist of innumerable small islands without any 
continuous mass of land. The energies of 
Jackson and his scientific staff were, therefore, 
concentrated on an examination of the archi¬ 
pelago. 

Establishing his winter quarters, on Septem¬ 
ber 8, at Cape Flora on Northbrook Island, 
Jackson built a hut there, to which he gave the 
name of Elmwood. There the provisions were 
stored, and there the party passed three win¬ 
ters. During the first winter the exploring 
vessel, the Windward, remained ice-bound in 
the immediate vicinity. In the three succeeding 
summers it visited the station with supplies and 
reinforcements. Though the members of the 
expedition had thus opportunities to return, 
they decided to remain till they had accom¬ 
plished their task, spending a thousand nights 
in the Arctic regions. 

On the ice, near Elmwood, occurred a dra¬ 
matic meeting between Jackson and Nansen, 
the latter, accompanied by his companion, 
Lieutenant F. H. Johansen, having spent the 
preceding winter in the north of Franz Josef 



© Underwood and Underwood 

AN ARCTIC EXPLORER COMING OUT OF HIS 

HE SPENT THE WINTER 


IGLOO WHERE 






NORTHEAST PASSAGE 


147 


Land. The men approached each other eagerly. 

“Aren’t you Nansen?” asked Jackson, after 
the two men had warmly greeted each other. 

“Yes, I am,” replied the Norwegian. “And 
he seized my hand,” says Nansen in his descrip¬ 
tion of the meeting, “and shook it again, while 
his whole face became one smile of welcome.” 

Nansen was delighted with the reception 
given to him and his comrade. They could not 
have fallen into better hands, he afterwards 
said, meeting with “unequalled hospitality and 
kindness” on all sides. They remained at Elm¬ 
wood till the arrival of the Windward , and sail¬ 
ing on board that vessel, were landed safely in 
Norway. 

The time spent at Cape Flora passed very 
pleasantly, and without the hardships endured 
by so many of the earlier expeditions. The 
work of exploration was steadily carried on, re¬ 
lieved now and then by encounters with bears. 
In one of these encounters Jackson narrowly 
escaped with his life. 

“I came across a bear close to the open water, 
with the dogs yelping around him and he roar¬ 
ing and making dashes at them,” he wrote in 
describing the incident. “Going up to within 
ten yards of him, I wounded him in the neck, 
but not sufficiently to stop him. 

“He reluctantly took to the water; but as it 


148 


NORTHEAST PASSAGE 


had a thickness of an inch of ice upon it, and 
was consequently difficult to swim through, he 
came out again and started across the floe at a 
good pace. The dogs and I followed. Every 
now and then he would stop to rush at one or 
other of the dogs, which, however, managed to 
dodge him. 

“As he appeared to be distancing me, I 
fired another shot. Whether it hit him or not 
I cannot say; but it had the effect of making 
him head back again towards the open water. 
As I had started out with only three cartridges, 
I had now only one left, so that on coming up 
with him again at the edge of the floe, I was 
particularly anxious to make sure of a fatal 
shot. 

“I found him about thirty yards from the 
water, which was covered with very thin ice. 
Wishing to make certain of him, I went up to 
within six or seven yards of him, when he 
rushed at me with his head low. I fired; but 
just as I did so, he threw his head up, causing 
the bullet to go between his forelegs. 

“He came at me with a roar and his mouth 
wide open, and in a second he was upon me. I 
could feel his warm breath upon my face; could 
see the gleam of his teeth, the shape of his long, 
gray tongue, and the fierce glare in his savage 
eyes. I had just time to remove the rifle from 


NORTHEAST PASSAGE 


149 


my shoulder, and to thrust the barrel with all 
my force into his open jaws, and then draw it 
back for another thrust. It was a trifle too 
much for him, apparently, for he whipped 
round and took to the water. I had now re- • 
luctantly to throw up the chase, for I had no 
more cartridges.” 

Another notable accomplishment is that 
of the Swedish explorer, Nordenskiold, who, in 
1878, discovered the Northeast Passage. 

We have already seen how the navigators of 
earlier centuries had sought for some route to 
the west that would connect Europe with India. 
But their efforts, bold and daring as they were, 
ended in disappointment. Nordenskiold suc¬ 
ceeded in the opposite direction; succeeded, too, 
without meeting with any serious difficulty, and 
without undergoing any of the hardships which 
had befallen the earlier explorers. 

On his return in 1876 from an expedition to 
the Siberian Polar Sea, Nordenskiold ex¬ 
pressed his belief that the open, navigable 
water, which had carried him across the Kara 
Sea to the mouth of the Yenisei, extended, in 
all probability, as far as Behring Strait. And 
if so, the circumnavigation of the Old World 
was within the bounds of possibility. 

Nordenskiold laid his plans before the King 
of Sweden, and with the approval of his sov- 


150 


NORTHEAST PASSAGE 


ereign and the support of leading men of 
science, the enterprise was soon arranged. 

The steamer Vega was purchased for the 
voyage and sailed in July, 1878. The vessel 
rounded Cape Chelyuskin, the most north¬ 
erly point of the Old World, but in pushing 
farther on found the ice rather troublesome. 
This difficulty gradually increased, until, in 
September, the Vega anchored on a grounded 
floe-berg near to Behring Strait. 

It was thought at first that the stay would 
be only temporary; but it soon became evident 
that no release from the ice could be expected 
that autumn, and accordingly the explorers 
settled down to pass the winter there. 

Not till July of the following year was the 
ship released. Then it was suddenly observed 
that the Vega was moving slowly. Two hours 
later the ship was under steam. 

Pursuing her way towards Behring Strait, 
the Vega passed Cape Serdze Kamen on the 
19th; and on the following day they were in 
the middle of the sound which unites the North 
Polar Sea with the Pacific, from which point 
they greeted the Old and the New Worlds with 
a salute of victory. 

“Thus,” says Nordenskiold, “we reached the 
goal towards which so many nations had strug¬ 
gled, from the time when Sir Hugh Willoughby 


NORTHEAST PASSAGE 


151 


ushered in the long series of Northeast voyages. 
Now, for the first time after the lapse of 336 
years, and when most men experienced in sea- 
matters had declared the undertaking impossi¬ 
ble, was the Northeast Passage at last achieved. 
This has taken place without the sacrifice of a 
single human life, without sickness among those 
who took part in the undertaking, and without 
the slighest damage to the vessel.” 


XIII 


NANSEN AT THE “FARTHEST 

NORTH.” 

W E have already noted the meeting of 
Nansen with other explorers on Franz 
Josef Land. He was one of the most 
famous of Arctic explorers, and set a new north¬ 
ern record. 

It was in 1893 that Dr. Fridtjof Nansen first 
started off on the search which had lured so 
many ambitious travelers. Never before, prob¬ 
ably, had Arctic explorer set out so admirably 
equipped. For nine years previous to his de¬ 
parture—beginning when he was twenty-three 
years old—Nansen had been considering his 
plans. Nothing was left to chance. As a result 
he penetrated much farther towards the Pole 
than any man had done before, and returned to 
civilization, after an absence of three years, with¬ 
out having to record a disaster or a serious ac¬ 
cident of any kind. 

For the great task which he had undertaken, 
Nansen seemed the ideal man. He was a trained 
athlete, an expert snow-shoe traveler, and a 
scientist of considerable attainments. Born 
near Christiania, in Norway, educated at its uni- 

( 152 ) 



NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 153 


versity, he was only twenty-one years of age 
when he took a trip to East Greenland for zoo¬ 
logical specimens. 

In 1888 he made his memorable journey over 
the Greenland ice-plateau. He lived with the 
Eskimos during that winter, sleeping in their 
rude huts and becoming accustomed to their 
manner of living. He thus laid up a valuable 
store of experiences, which made a fitting pre¬ 
paration for the work of the coming years. 
When the time came, he was able to live just like 
the Eskimos, and to this fact he probably owed 
his life. 

Relieving in the theory of a drift from east to 
west, Nansen boldly announced his intention of 
putting that theory to the test, declaring that a 
vessel which got frozen in to the north of Siberia 
must drift across the Polar Sea, and out into the 
Atlantic. 

Nansen himself made the model for the Fram, 
which was regarded as the strongest vessel ever 
used in Arctic exploration. The hull, round and 
slippery like an eel, with no corners or edges to 
give a grip to the ice, was specially designed for 
ice-pressure. The inventor’s theory was that, 
when the ice closed round the ship, she would not 
be crushed to matchwood, but would be lifted on 
to the floe, on which her flat bottom would enable 
her to rest without fear of capsizing. 


154 NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 


Experts laughed at the idea. Nothing, they 
declared, could save the Fram from destruction 
when in the embrace of the frozen masses; but 
their grim predictions were not fulfilled. The 
Fram behaved, when put to the test, just as 
Nansen said she would, and rested safely on the 
ice when there was no longer water in which to 
float. 

Nansen sailed from Christiania on board the 
Fram, in June, 1893, accompanied by twelve 
of his hardy countrymen. Leaving the shores of 
Norway behind, they pursued their way north¬ 
wards, and on July 25, sighted Novaya Zem- 
lya. A thick fog prevailed at the time, and in¬ 
stead of making for land, as had been intended, 
the course was set eastwards towards Yugor 
Strait. 

Two days later, while they were still envel¬ 
oped in fog, the first ice was encountered. 
There was little of it to begin with; but the fol¬ 
lowing morning, as far as the eye could reach— 
the fog having lifted—the ice extended every¬ 
where—a bad lookout for such an early period 
of the season. 

Forcing her way through, and already reveal¬ 
ing her splendid qualities among the frozen 
masses, the Fram reached Yugor Strait, and 
passed into the dreaded Kara Sea early in Au¬ 
gust. / 



NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 155 


The whole story of his adventurous quest is 
told in his “Farthest North”*—much of it in 
diary form. It is one of the most fascinating of 
travel books in its picturesque descriptions. 

This is the record of August 26th: “Many 
new islands in various directions. Any num¬ 
ber of unknown islands, so many that one’s 
head gets confused in trying to keep account of 
them all. In the morning we passed a very 
rocky one, and beyond it I saw two others. 
After them land or islands farther to the north 
and still more to the northeast. We had to go 
out of our course in the afternoon, because we 
dared not pass between two large islands on ac¬ 
count of possible shoals. The islands were 
round in form, like those we had seen farther 
back, but were of a good height. Now we held 
east again, with four biggish islands and two 
islets in the offing. On our other side we pres¬ 
ently had a line of flat islands with steep shores. 
The channel was far from safe here. In the 
evening we suddenly noticed large stones stand¬ 
ing up above the water among some ice-floes 
close on our port bow, and on our starboard beam 
was a shoal with stranded ice-floes. We sounded, 
but found over twenty-one fathoms of water.” 

* The quotations in this chapter are made by permission 
from “Farthest North,” by Dr. Fridtjof Nansen. Copyright, 
1897, by Harper & Brothers. 



156 NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 

Nansen had always said that if they could get 
safely across the Kara Sea and past Cape Chel¬ 
yuskin, the worst would be over. Fortune was 
with the explorers, the navigation of the Kara 
Sea being much easier than they had anticipated; 
and early in September, Cape Chelyuskin, the 
northernmost point of the Old World, was safely 
passed. They had thus avoided the danger of a 
winter’s imprisonment on that coast; and before 
them the way lay clear to their goal, the drift- 
ice to the north of the New Siberian Islands. 

Steaming along the west of these islands, 
Nansen found himself puzzled with regard to 
the movements of the ice. “How in the world,” 
we find him asking in his diary, is it not swept 
northwards by the current which, according to 
my calculations, ought to set north from this 
coast, and which we ourselves have felt? And it 
is such hard, thick ice—has the appearance of be¬ 
ing several years old. Does it come from the 
eastward, or does it lie and grind round here? 
I cannot yet tell; but, anyhow, it is different 
from the thin, one-year-old ice we have seen un¬ 
til now in the Kara Sea and west of Cape Chel¬ 
yuskin.” 

On September 12, he writes: “Henriksen 
awoke me this morning at six with the informa¬ 
tion that there were several walruses lying on a 
floe quite close to us. ‘By Jove!’ Up I jumped 



NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 157 


and had my clothes on in a trice. It was a 
lovely morning—fine, still weather ; the walruses’ 
guffaw sounded over to us along the clear ice 
surface. They were lying crowded together on 
a floe a little to landward from us, blue moun¬ 
tains glittered behind them in the sun.” 

Body to body the walruses stretched on a 
small floe, old and young mixed. Enormous 
masses of flesh they were! Now and again one 
of the ladies fanned herself by moving one of 
her flippers backward and forward over her 
body; then she lay quiet again on her back or side. 
“Good gracious! what a lot of meat!” said Juell, 
who was cook. More and more cautiously they 
drew near as Nansen made ready with the gun. 
Henriksen took a good grip of the harpoon shaft, 
and as the boat touched the floe he rose, and off 
flew the harpoon. But it struck too high, glanced 
off the tough hide, and skipped over the backs of 
the animals. Now there was a lively rumpus. 
Ten or twelve great faces glared around at 
once; the colossal creatures twisted themselves 
round with incredible celerity, and came wad¬ 
dling with lifted heads and hollow bellowings to 
the edge of the ice near the hunters. It was un¬ 
deniably an imposing sight; but Nansen brought 
his gun to his shoulder and fired at one of the 
biggest beasts, bringing it down. 

On September 22, the Fram’s progress was 


158 NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 

finally blocked. Three days later, when the ice 
had closed around her, Nansen expressed the 
opinion that they were now frozen in for good; 
and he did not expect to get the Fram out of the 
ice till they were on the other side of the Pole, 
nearing the Atlantic Ocean. 

Now began the long, weary imprisonment 
that was to end they knew not how. Would the 
Fram, if she survived the ice-pressure, drift in 
the direction which they anticipated, or was 
there awaiting them a fate which they were 
afraid even to contemplate? These were ques¬ 
tions to which no answer could be given. All 
they could do was to wait with patience and 
calmness to see what the long Arctic night would 
bring to them. 

As the days went by, the Fram proved a safe 
and comfortable home. With a noise like thun¬ 
der, the ice pressed against her stout sides, piling 
itself up in great walls and threatening destruc¬ 
tion to the expedition. Rut to all attacks the 
Fram offered a stubborn resistance, and the men 
on board rejoiced in their security. 

Only twice during the prolonged stay amid 
the ice did the crew fear the consequences of the 
pressure. On one of these occasions the situa¬ 
tion became so alarming that sledges and provi¬ 
sions were placed upon a neighboring floe in 
preparation for the worst; but their fears proved 


NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 159 


groundless. As Nansen afterwards said, “The 
Fram was stronger than our faith in her.” 

While the days on board the Fram were passed 
in comfort, they were monotonous; but to the 
commander of the expedition they were full of 
anxious thought. The vessel drifted slowly with 
the ice; but the drift for a time was southwards, 
and Nansen was naturally much concerned at 
this. It was not the direction in which he de¬ 
sired to go. He had not calculated upon moving 
to the south; and at the beginning of November 
we find him in a despondent mood. Sitting “in 
the still winter night on the drifting ice-floe,” 
with only the stars above him, he sorrowfully 
confesses that his plan has come to nothing. 

Nevertheless, he persisted in his plan of keep¬ 
ing away from land. He cast his fortunes, in¬ 
stead, with the drifting ice. 

“Earlier Arctic explorers,” he says, “have 
considered it a necessity to keep near some coast. 
But this was exactly what I wanted to avoid. 
It was the drift of the ice that I wished to get 
into, and what I most feared was being blocked 
by land. It seemed as if we might do much 
worse than give ourselves up to the ice where we 
were—especially as our excursion to the east 
had proved that following the ice-edge in that 
direction would soon force us south again. So 
in the meantime we made fast to a great ice- 



160 NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 


block and prepared to clean the boiler and shift 
coals. We are lying in open water, with only a 
few large floes here and there; but I have a pre¬ 
sentiment that this is our winter harbor.” 

A little later he writes: “Now we are in the 
very midst of what the prophets would have had 
us dread so much. The ice is pressing and pack¬ 
ing round us with a noise like thunder. It is 
piling itself up into long walls, and heaps high 
enough to reach a good way up the Frames rig¬ 
ging; in fact, it is trying its very utmost to grind 
the Fram into powder. But here we sit quite 
tranquil, not even going up to look at all the 
hurly-burly, but just chatting and laughing as 
usual.” 

Trying as these days were, they were not with¬ 
out their compensations; for it was while the 
Fram was slowly drifting with the ice-pack that 
Nansen made what is regarded as the greatest 
discovery of the voyage—“the existence of a 
wide, deep sea towards the Pole, a continuation 
of the Arctic Sea, situated between Greenland 
on the one hand, and Norway and Spitzbergen 
on the other.” 

A northerly drift at last setting in, the Fram 
was gradually carried to latitude 83° 59', at 
which point Nansen left her, to continue his way 
Poleward on foot, after handing the ship over to 
the command of Captain Sverdrup. 



NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 161 


Nansen’s companion on his sledge journey 
was Lieutenant Johansen. It was a hazardous 
undertaking to cut themselves off from the ship 
and to wander out into the unknown. There 
were certainly hardships ahead; there were in¬ 
numerable difficulties and dangers, and there 
might even be death. But Nansen and his com¬ 
panion were not afraid to take the risks, and with 
dogs and sledges they set out from the Fram. 
They proposed to travel northwards for fifty 
days, as they had only provisions to last for a 
hundred days, which was all they could carry 
over the rugged ice-floes. 

For the first week the progress was most sat¬ 
isfactory. The ice was good and traveling was 
easy. These favorable conditions, however, did 
not last. The flat track soon gave way to rough 
and uneven ice, involving an expenditure of 
physical energy that tried the travelers to the 
utmost. 

On May 20, 1895, he writes: “Went out on 
snow-shoes in the forenoon. The ice has been 
very much broken up in various directions, ow¬ 
ing to the continual winds during the last week. 
The lanes are difficult to cross over, as they are 
full of small pieces of ice, that lie dispersed 
about, and are partly covered with drift-snow. 
This is very deceptive, for one may seem to have 
firm ice under at places where, on sticking one’s 


162 NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 


staff in, it goes right down without any sign of 
ice. On many occasions I nearly got into trouble 
in crossing over snow like this on snow-shoes. I 
would suddenly find that the snow was giving 
way under me, and would manage with no little 
difficulty to get safely back on to the firm ice.” 

Sometimes they were almost asleep as they 
wearily dragged the sledges along, pulling for 
nine or ten hours each day, often in the face of 
blinding snowstorms, with the flo^s in constant 
motion and grinding against each other with a 
loud and terrifying noise. 

By the beginning of April it was obvious that 
it would be impossible to reach the Pole over such 
ice as they were then encountering; and the two 
travelers seriously considered the advisability of 
turning back. They, however, resolutely kept 
their faces to the north for some days longer, 
meeting with ridges on their toilsome way, and 
sometimes falling into the water. 

On April 8, the prospect was still forbidding. 
From the highest hummocks nothing was to be 
seen but “a chaos of ice-blocks stretching as far 
as the horizon.” With the feeling that they were 
sacrificing valuable time and achieving little, 
Nansen decided to stop, and to shape their course 
for Cape Fligely. They were then in latitude 
86° 13.6', only 261 miles from the Pole, and 195 
miles nearer to it than man had ever stood before. 


NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 163 


It was hard to give up; but at the rate at which 
they were then advancing it would have taken 
at least two months more to reach the Pole, and 
with only two weeks’ supply of food left, it would 
have been suicide to go on. 

When they turned southwards, open water¬ 
ways and wet snow delayed their march. There 
was no sign of land in any direction, and no open 
water; and the number of the dogs, as they were 
killed to feed their companions, was rapidly 
growing less. 

The middle of June found them plodding on, 
not knowing where they were; and there were 
moments when it seemed impossible that “any 
creature not possessed of wings could get far¬ 
ther.” The provisions were dwindling, the 
sledges ran heavily in the snow, and things were 
getting worse instead of better. But never for a 
moment did the two men think of yielding. 

They had many escapes as they fought their 
way together. On one occasion a large bear had 
been following them unobserved for some time; 
and they had a lively session, as Nansen graphic- 
ally describes: 

“After having cleared the side of the lane 
from young ice and brash, I drew my sledge to 
the end of the ice, and was holding it to prevent 
it slipping in, when I heard a scuffle behind me, 
and Johansen, who had just turned round to 


164 NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 


pull his sledge flush with mine, cried, ‘Take the 
gun!’ I turned round and saw an enormous 
bear throwing itself on him, and Johansen on 
his back. I tried to seize my gun, which was in 
its case on the fore-deck, but at the same mo¬ 
ment the kayak slipped into the water. My first 
thought was to throw myself into the water over 
the kayak and fire from there, but I recognized 
how risky it would be. I began to pull the 
kayak, with its heavy cargo, on to the high edge 
of the ice again as quickly as I could, and was on 
my knees pulling and tugging to get at my gun. 
I had no time to look round and see what was 
going on behind me, when I heard Johansen 
quietly say, ‘You must look sharp if you want to 
be in time!’ ” 

“Look sharp? I should think so! At last I 
got hold of the butt-end, dragged the gun out, 
turned round in a sitting posture, and cocked 
the shot-barrel. The bear was standing not two 
yards off, ready to make an end to my dog, 
‘Kaifas.’ There was no time to lose in cocking 
the other barrel, so I gave it a charge of shot be¬ 
hind the ear, and it fell down dead between us. 

“The bear must have followed our track like a 
cat, and, covered by the ice-blocks, have slunk up 
while we were clearing the ice from the lane and 
had our backs to him. We could see by the trail 
how it had crept over a small ridge just behind 


NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 165 


us under cover of a mound by Johansen’s kayak. 
While the latter, without suspecting anything 
or looking round, went back and stooped down 
to pick up the hauling-rope, he suddenly caught 
sight of an animal crouched up at the end of 
the kayak, but thought it was ‘Suggen;’ and 
before he had time to realize that it was so big he 
received a cuff on the ear which made him see 
fireworks, and then, as I mentioned before, over 
he went on his back. He tried to defend himself 
as best he could with his fists. With one hand he 
seized the throat of the animal, and held fast, 
clinching it with all his might. It was just as the 
bear was about to bite Johansen in the head that 
he uttered the memorable words, ‘Look sharp!’ 
The bear kept glancing at me continually, spec¬ 
ulating, no doubt, as to what I was going to do; 
but then caught sight of the dog and turned to¬ 
wards it. Johansen let go as quick as thought, 
and wiggled himself away, while the bear gave 
‘Suggen’ a cuff which made him howl lustily, 
just as he does when we thrash him. Then 
‘Kaifas’ got a slap on the nose. Meanwhile 
Johansen had struggled to his legs, and when 
freed had got his gun, which was sticking out of 
the kayak hole. The only harm done was that 
the bear had scraped some grime off Johansen’s 
right cheek, so that he had a white stripe on it. 


166 NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 


and had given him a slight wound in one hand; 
‘Kaifas’ had also got a scratch on his nose.” 

When they reached the open water on August 
6, Nansen and Johansen took to their kayaks. 
Gliding before the wind, they skirted along the 
shores of several glacier-covered islands. They 
landed on one of them four days later, and had 
the solid earth under their feet for the first time 
in two years. They had travelled 430 miles in 
four months. 

Reaching the north end of Franz Josef Land— 
though the travelers did not know till months 
afterwards that it was there they had landed— 
Nansen and his companion lived through the 
long winter in a hut which they erected, and 
subsisted like the natives on bear, seal, and wal¬ 
rus. Fortunately this food did not fail them; 
but they suffered much from the cold. 

Leaving their winter quarters in May, they 
started in a southwesterly direction along the 
land, intending to cross over to Spitzbergen at 
the nearest point. Proceeding southwards over 
the shore-ice, they sometimes found it possible 
to use a sail on their sledges, which skimmed 
along before the wind like boats on the water. 
In this way they made good progress, discover¬ 
ing new islands, and finding in this snow region 
much that was fascinating and mysterious. 

Reaching the edge of the ice, they saw the 


NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 167 


blue water spread invitingly before them. Lash¬ 
ing their kayaks together and hoisting the sail, 
they put to sea; and speeding along under a 
favorable breeze, they reached the south of the 
land on which they had been wintering so long. 
Putting in to the edge of the ice that they might 
relieve their stiffened limbs by walking, they 
fixed their tiny canoes to the ice, and ascended 
a neighboring hummock in order to obtain a 
view over the water. 

Suddenly Johansen cried out that the kayaks 
were adrift. Both men ran to the edge of the 
ice with all speed; but by the time they reached 
it, the canoes were already drifting quickly away. 
Realizing that not a moment was to be lost, 
Nansen hastily threw off some of his outer gar¬ 
ments and plunged into the ice-cold water. But 
it was hard work swimming with clothes on, and 
as the kayaks appeared to be drifting more 
quickly than he could swim, he was very doubt¬ 
ful of his ability to reach them. All they pos¬ 
sessed was drifting from them on the slim boats, 
and Nansen well knew that life itself was in the 
balance. Johansen watched him all the time 
from the ice-edge in an agony of mind, but ut¬ 
terly unable to render any assistance. 

Nansen fought his way through the water till 
his limbs stiffened and lost their feeling, and he 
was just on the verge of collapse when he reached 


168 NANSEN’S FARTHEST NORTH 


the kayaks. With difficulty he pulled himself 
on board; and he was so stiff with cold that he 
could scarcely paddle ashore. But having suc¬ 
ceeded so far, he was determined not to fail now; 
and making a mighty effort, he brought the 
kayaks back to a place of safety, much to their 
united joy. 

The next day found both men again on the 
water. They were nearer to the end of their 
troubles than they dared to hope; but their ad¬ 
ventures were not yet over. 

One day a huge walrus suddenly shot up be¬ 
side Nansen, and, throwing itself on the edge of 
the kayak, tried to upset it with its strong tusks. 
In vain Nansen applied the paddle with all his 
might to the animal’s head. The blows fell 
harmlessly; the deck was already under water, 
and the walrus was clearly having the best of the 
combat, when it turned around and disappeared 
as quickly as it had come. The kayak, how¬ 
ever, had been injured in the struggle, and was 
leaking badly; and, to avoid sinking, Nansen 
ran it on to a ledge of ice. 

In June, as described in the preceding chap¬ 
ter, Nansen fell in with Jackson, of the Jackson- 
Harmsworth Expedition, then exploring in 
Franz Josef Land. After remaining for some 
time with the English party, Nansen and his 
companion sailed in the Windward . They 



WITH DIFFICULTY HE PULLED HIMSELF ON BOARD 





















NANSEN S FARTHEST NORTH 169 


reached Norway in August, and were welcomed 
with great enthusiasm. 

Only one thing was required to complete the 
rejoicings. That was the safe return of the 
Fram, of which nothing whatever had been 
heard. Her arrival, however, was not long de¬ 
layed, for only seven days later Nansen received 
a telegram from Captain Sverdrup, telling 
him that the Fram, had arrived in good condi¬ 
tion, and that all on board were well. 

The adventures of the Fram after Nansen’s 
departure can be told in very few words. At 
that time the vessel lay ice-bound. Little vari¬ 
ation occurred in the drift during the next few 
months; but there were occasional disturbances 
in the ice, until in August the floe on which the 
vessel rested suddenly broke, and the Fram was 
again in the water. 

There was now little probability that the 
Fram would drift farther to the north; and as 
the exploration of that region had been under¬ 
taken by Nansen and Johansen, Sverdrup felt 
that, in accordance with his instructions, he 
ought to make for open water and home. But 
though no longer imprisoned in the ice, they 
had still another winter to pass amid the floes. 
It went by without special incident and with 
the next summer the staunch ship was able to 
sail for home. 


170 NANSEN S FARTHEST NORTH 


What had the expedition accomplished? 
The Pole was still tinconquered, but a wide sea 
of oceanic depth had been discovered; an area 
of 50,000 square miles of unknown waters had 
been traversed; the direction of the Polar cur¬ 
rents had been ascertained, and Nansen’s the¬ 
ories in great measure established; all previous 
records as regards nearness to the Pole had 
been surpassed; the Fram had more than justi¬ 
fied Nansen’s faith in her, and her stout tim¬ 
bers had fought a winning battle with the grind¬ 
ing floes; and Nansen and Johansen had per¬ 
formed a wonderful sledge journey into un¬ 
known regions. 

This will remain as one of the most unique 
and successful of Polar expeditions. 


A 


XIV 

THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE NAVI¬ 
GATED AT LAST 

T HE years that immediately followed 
Nansen’s attainment of the “Farthest 
North” witnessed a remarkable rush of 
other expeditions. The Pole still lured men 
from home and country. 

The methods which had been employed for 
centuries having failed to bring adventurous 
man to the Pole, Salomon Auguste Andree, a 
Swedish professor and aeronaut, in 1895 laid 
before the Academy of Sciences a daring and 
novel project for exploring the regions of the 
North Pole with the aid of a balloon. 

Andree had been a member of a Swedish me¬ 
teorological expedition that had passed a winter 
in Spitzbergen, and had directed experiments 
in atmospheric electricity. He had also held 
an important engineering position under the 
Swedish Government. 

On a voyage to America, he had been im¬ 
pressed with the regularity of the trade-winds; 
and the possibility of balloon voyages across the 
Atlantic then occurred to him. 

He interested others in his project for reach- 

(171) 


172 N.W. PASSAGE NAVIGATED 


ing the Pole by baloon; and a national sub¬ 
scription, to which the King of Sweden liber¬ 
ally contributed, soon supplied him with the 
necessary funds. He constructed a large bal¬ 
loon, which he named the Eagle, and erecting 
a balloon-house on Dane’s Island, Spitzbergen, 
he made everything ready for his enterprise, 
and waited for the south wind which was neces¬ 
sary for a start. The favorable breeze came on 
July 11, 1897; and with two companions. 
Nils Strindberg and Knut Fraenkel, he made 
the ascent. The balloon rose to a height of 
about 3000 feet, and disappeared from view in 
about an hour after leaving the earth. The start 
seemed auspicious. 

“With a fairly strong wind,” wrote one of 
Andree’s companions just before the start, “we 
shall make from ten to twenty knots an hour, 
and should reach the Pole in from thirty to 
sixty hours. Once having reached our goal, we 
don’t care where the wind carries us. We 
would, of course, rather land in Alaska, near 
the Mackenzie River, where we should very 
likely meet American whalers, who are favor¬ 
ably disposed toward the expedition. But even 
if we were obliged to leave the balloon and pro¬ 
ceed over the ice, we should not consider our¬ 
selves lost. We have sledges and provisions for 
four months, guns and ammunition; hence we 


N. W. PASSAGE NAVIGATED 173 


are just as well equipped as other expeditions 
have been.” 

Four days after the balloon’s departure, a 
carrier-pigeon alighted on the rigging of the 
sealer Aiken, then cruising in the vicinity of 
Spitzbergen. Attached to a tail-feather of the 
bird was a small tube, containing a message in 
the handwriting of Andree as follows: “July 
13, 12.30 p. M., latitude 82° 2'; longitude 15° 
5' east. Good progress. All well on board. This 
is the third pigeon dispatch.— Andree/ j This 
was the only message ever received from the 
occupants of the balloon. 

As time went by and no further word was 
received, expeditions went in search of Andree 
and his companions; but the quest was fruit¬ 
less. Whether they landed in the sea and were 
drowned, or descended on the pack-ice and per¬ 
ished there, finding it impossible to sledge over 
the rough surface of the frozen water, will prob¬ 
ably never be known. 

In June, 1899, Prince Luigi, Duke of the 
Abruzzi, sailed from Christiania in the Polar 
Star, a strong whaling-vessel, with a well-equip¬ 
ped expedition, hoping, as so many had done be¬ 
fore him, to reach the most northerly point in the 
world. Besides possessing great physical 
strength, the Duke was a man of scientific and 
scholarly attainments. Much of his boyhood 


174 N. W. PASSAGE NAVIGATED 


having been passed under the shadow of the 
Italian Alps, it was not strange that he should 
be lured to that point of the globe on which no 
man had ever stood. 

One of his earliest and most daring adven¬ 
tures was to ascend, in 1897, to the summit of 
Mount St. Elias, one of the highest mountains 
of the Alaskan range. He was the first man 
who had ever reached the summit of that lofty 
mountain which is 18,000 feet high. 

Before setting out on his Arctic expedition, 
the Duke spent two years in the preparation of 
his plans, consulting with Nansen, Nordenski- 
old, and other Arctic explorers, and learning 
from their own lips the secrets of their successes 
and failures. 

Proceeding to Franz Josef Land, the Polar 
Star was beached on Prince Rudolf Island, and 
and there winter quarters were established. 

In the following spring, sledge parties under 
Captain Cagni started on their way towards the 
Pole. In spite of tremendous difficulties, they 
reached in April latitude 86° 33' 49", exceeding 
Nansen’s record by eighteen miles, and plant¬ 
ing the Italian flag well in front of all its rivals. 

In the hard work of the expedition the Duke 
manfully took his share. During one of the 
preliminary sledge-trips in the spring, he had 
his right hand severely frosted, and two of his 


N. W. PASSAGE NAVIGATED 175 


fingers had to be partially amputated; but he 
remained cheerful and active, and did much to 
keep his men bright and happy amid the dark¬ 
ness of the long winter night. 

Another explorer who strove hard, but in 
vain, to reach the Pole was Walter Wellman, 
an American traveler and journalist. In 1894? 
he led an expedition into the North, reaching 
latitude 81° north-east of Spitzbergen. 

Four years later he again ventured into the 
frozen wilderness, making more progress on 
this occasion, when he attained latitude 82°, and 
discovered many islands. His party consisted 
of four Americans and five Norwegians, and 
their departure from the little town of Tromso, 
in Norway, was made in June, 1898, in the 
steamer Frithjof, a staunch ship specially built 
for hard work in heavy ice. 

This expedition was marked by a fortunate 
disaster which overtook Wellman’s sledge party 
in Franz Josef Land in March, 1899, and which 
put a sudden end to the dash Polewards. At 
the time of the occurrence they had covered 
about 140 of the 700 miles which lay between 
their winter quarters and the Pole. 

Falling into a crack in the ice, Wellman hurt 
his right leg. When the accident happened he 
regarded it as the worst of ill-fortune; but it 
was probably the means of saving all their lives 


176 N.W. PASSAGE NAVIGATED 


two days later, when an extraordinary upheaval 
of the ice occurred. 

When that took place they were in the one 
spot from which it was possible to escape. Had 
it not been for the injury to Wellman’s leg, 
they would have been able to travel faster 
than they did, with consequences that in all like¬ 
lihood would have been fatal to all. 

A few days later a terrible storm from the 
northeast burst over the little party; the air 
was filled with drifting snow, and all around 
them the ice opened in great cracks. The floe 
on which they stood tilted over, the one edge 
down in the sea, and the other up in the air. 
Hastening over the quaking pieces of ice and 
across a chasm, in which the water was run¬ 
ning like a mill-race, they reached a larger floe, 
which offered them safety for the time being. 

Though the party had escaped a terrible 
death, they had suffered serious loss. Some 
of the dogs were missing, and food, clothing, 
and instruments also had disappeared. Under 
these circumstances the dash to the Pole was 
ended, for it would have meant death to proceed 
farther. 

Though defeated on this occasion, Wellman 
made one more attempt; but again he had to re¬ 
turn without achieving the coveted distinction 
of finding the Pole. Emulating Andree, he 


N. W. PASSAGE NAVIGATED 177 


started out in his airship, the America, from his 
headquarters at Virgo Bay, Spitzbergen; but 
beaten back by storms, he was forced on to a 
glacier, and there his undertaking had to be 
abandoned. 

Although these expeditions had failed to at¬ 
tain their principal object a number of successes 
had been achieved. 

Success crowned the attempt of the Norwe¬ 
gian seaman, Eoald Amundsen, to navigate 
the Northwest Passage. The honor of its dis¬ 
covery had fallen to the men of Pranklin s un¬ 
fortunate expedition, who did not live to come 
back to tell of their achievement. In 1850, Sir 
Robert McClure also solved the problem of the 
Passage; but although the existence of a Pass¬ 
age was proved, it was doubtful whether it was 
practicable for ships, as no one had ever navi¬ 
gated it throughout. 

When Nansen returned from this wonder¬ 
ful Greenland expedition in 1889, Amundsen, 
then a lad, stood with throbbing pulses among 
the crowds who welcomed back the popular 
hero \ and as he listened to the tumultuous 
cheering, a voice seemed to whisper to him, If 
you could make the Northwest Passage! 

That was the beginning of the idea, which 
remained with him till the great feat was accom¬ 
plished. The time came when he went seal- 


178 N.W. PASSAGE NAVIGATED 


fishing; and later on he took part in the Belgian 
Antarctic Expedition, during which voyage he 
thought much about the dream of his boyhood, 
and began to lay his plans. 

The voyage began in 1903 and lasted for 
three years. He set sail from Christiania in the 
Gjoa, a tiny craft built originally as a fishing 
boat. Excellent progress was made from the 
very beginning; and though ice was encoun¬ 
tered, it was not heavy enough to cause any con¬ 
siderable delay. 

On the night of August 31, the expedition 
almost came to a sudden and terrible end. The 
stillness of the night was broken by an awful 
shriek, which reached the commander’s ears as 
he was entering in his journal the events of the 
day. Looking up, he saw a great flame, with 
thick, suffocating smoke, leaping through the 
engine-room skylight. Instantly he knew what 
it meant. The engine-room, where there were 
tanks containing 2200 gallons of petroleum, 
was on fire. If the fire should reach the tanks, 
the Gjoa and everything on board would be 
blown to atoms. 

All hands set to work with feverish haste. 
The fire-extinguishing appliances, kept in 
readiness for such an emergency, were brought 
into play, and the men, knowing that their lives 
depended upon their exertions, worked with a 


N.W. PASSAGE NAVIGATED 179 


will, and pumped water on the fire till the dan¬ 
ger was past. 

Soon after this occurrence another misadven- 
tured befell the Gjoa. Running aground, the 
vessel was lifted up by the high, choppy sea and 
pitched upon the rocks. It seemed impossible 
for the ship to hold together, buffeted as she 
was by the wind and waves. So far as could be 
seen, there was no alternative but to abandon 
the Gjoa to her fate. Bumping on the bare 
rocks, she lay at the mercy of the angry 
breakers; but fortunately she slid off again into 
the water, and skilful navigation brought her 
safely away from the shoals that lay around 
and into deeper and safer water. 

A couple of winters were passed among the 
ice in a little anchorage in King William Land, 
which they christened Gjoahavn; and there an 
observatory was built for the carrying out of 
the magnetic observations. The channels at 
last being open, the vessel left Gjoahavn in the 
summer of 1905; but in the following month 
the ice proved too powerful an enemy, and at 
King Point the third winter in the Frozen 
Land was passed. It was the summer of 1906 
before the voyage was resumed, and the re¬ 
mainder of the famous Passage was then suc¬ 
cessfully navigated. The little ship skirted the 
northern shore of Alaska, reaching Cape Nome 


180 N. W. PASSAGE NAVIGATED 


on the last day of August. The route had taken 
them through Davis Strait, Baffin Bay, Barrow 
Strait, and a succession of other straits to Cape 
Parry and Franklin Bay. Truly a daring voy¬ 
age worthy of the Vikings of old! 


XV 


PEARY’S TWENTY YEARS OF 
ARCTIC STRUGGLE 

N O man ever struggled harder or with 
more persistence to reach the goal of his 
ambition than Robert Edwin Peary, the 
American Arctic explorer who was finally to 
receive this great prize of the conquest of the 
North Pole. 

Eight voyages altogether Peary made into 
the Arctic regions, bravely facing their dan¬ 
gers, overcoming their difficulties, discovering 
their secrets, learning from experience how to 
cope with their peculiar conditions, improving 
the methods of sledging, and coming gradually 
nearer to the glittering Pole, until at last he has 
stood at the goal and planted there the flag of 
his country. 

Other men have been baffled in the desolate 
wilderness of the North only to return to it, and 
to fight better because of their defeat; but none 
of them maintained the struggle as Peary did, 
or repeated it so often. His success did not 
come through chance, or easily. He won it 
through twenty years of struggle. 

Peary’s introduction to the Frozen North be- 

( 181 ) 


182 PEARY’S LONG STRUGGLE 


gan in the year 1886, when he made the ac¬ 
quaintance of the Greenland ice-cap; and it was 
not long before he again answered the call of 
the North and returned to its frigid regions. 

Sailing from New York, accompanied by 
Mrs. Peary and a party of five, in June, 1891, 
he established winter quarters on the eastern 
side of McCormick Bay. There the winter was 
passed in preparation for the land journey; and 
in April, 1892, accompanied by Eivind Astrup, 
Peary began his attempt to cross Greenland 
to the northeast. He successfully completed 
his journey at Navy Cliff, latitude 83° 27', 
where he gained an unbroken and commanding 
view of the Arctic Ocean, proving that Green¬ 
land is an island. For this achievement he sub¬ 
sequently received the gold medals of the Royal 
Geographical Society of England and the Na¬ 
tional Geographical Society of America. 

This was but the beginning of a series of ex¬ 
peditions, which while unsuccessful in their 
main object brought him a little nearer each 
time, or gave him valuable data for later work. 
By the spring of 1906 he succeeded in reaching 
87° 6' north latitude, or within 174 geographical 
miles of the North Pole, thus creating another 
“Farthest North” record. 

This is but the briefest summary of what 
Peary accomplished before his final dash to the 


PEARY’S LONG STRUGGLE 183 


Pole: but in order to know something more of 
the man, and of the hardships that he coura¬ 
geously endured, we will follow one or two of 
his expeditions in more detail. 

Embarking upon his seventh voyage to the 
Arctic in 1898, Peary was determined not to re¬ 
turn until he had reached the Pole. His plan 
was to establish a base as far north as possible, 
and thence to make a march towards the Pole 
with dogs and sledges. But before making this 
dash, he intended to send out parties to store 
provisions in depots along the route which he 
purposed following, so that with reduced bur¬ 
dens he might travel faster. He hoped by this 
arrangement to overcome the difficulty of hav¬ 
ing to carry sufficient food for men and dogs. 

After encountering moving floes on the voy¬ 
age, his ship, the Windward , was eventually 
stopped by the ice in Allman Bay, 250 miles 
south of Sherrard Osborne Fjord, the point 
Peary had hoped to reach before being shut in 
by the ice. Compelled by the state of the ice 
to give up the idea, Peary resolved to convey 
his supplies to Fort Conger. To reach it meant 
traveling by a route never before trodden by 
man, along exposed coasts, with the difficulties 
increased by the darkness of winter, which had 
now settled down. 

Careful preparations having been made, 


184 PEARY’S LONG STRUGGLE 


Peary with four companions started from All- 
man Bay; but hardly had he left the ship when 
it became evident that the difficulties were much 
greater than he had anticipated. A terrific 
storm of wind opposed their progress during 
the first two days; and as the drifting snow was 
as fine as sand, the sledges sank deeply into it 
and could scarcely be dragged along. Huge 
masses of ice, rising to a height of a hundred 
feet in some places, towered above them, and 
barred their progress. 

Fighting against these conditions, both men 
and dogs soon suffered from the strain; and as 
the march was slow the provisions failed to hold 
out. “Just south of Cape de Fosse,” says 
Peary, “we ate the last of our biscuits; just 
north of it the last of our beans. At Cape John 
Barrow a dog was killed for food.” In this 
pitiable plight the three Americans and two 
Eskimos forced their way till only one more 
headland lay between them and Fort Conger. 
Groping their way in the darkness, they strug¬ 
gled on, frozen and half-famished, for eighteen 
hours till they reached the dilapidated building 
from which, fifteen years before, Greely and his 
party had begun the retreat which ended in a 
tragedy. 

Arrived at the end of the journey, Peary be¬ 
came conscious of a peculiar feeling in his right 


PEARY’S LONG STRUGGLE 185 


foot, and by the dim light of a flickering lamp, 
he found that both his feet were severely frost¬ 
bitten, being, in fact, frozen solid. For six 
weeks he lay helpless at Fort Conger, suffering 
agonies from the pain in his limbs. By the un¬ 
remitting care of Surgeon Dedrick, who had ac¬ 
companied the party, the limbs were saved, but 
no fewer than seven toes were hopelessly af¬ 
fected, and these could only be amputated on 
board the Windward, then lying 250 miles to 
the southward. 

With the temperature between sixty and sev¬ 
enty degrees below zero, the journey back to the 
ship was begun, Peary being lashed to a sledge 
and covered with musk-ox skins. Though suf¬ 
fering intensely on the way, he did not complain. 
Fortunately the traveling was comparatively 
easy, and in ten days the Windward was reached. 
After the operation Peary made a wonderfully 
speedy recovery, and by the beginning of April 
he was again busy preparing for the advance 
northwards. 

Another expedition, which began in July, 
1905, and during which Peary made another 
record march towards the Pole, was full of ad¬ 
ventures and narrow escapes. After the usual 
encounters with the ice on the northward voyage, 
his new vessel, the Roosevelt, reached Cape 
Sheridan, and went into winter quarters. There 


186 PEARY’S LONG STRUGGLE 


the winter months passed pleasantly, but some¬ 
what monotonously. 

The return of spring was the signal for begin¬ 
ning active operations. On February 19, the 
earliest possible date, the first sledge party 
started off Polewards, other parties following 
a few days later. On the 28th, the various parties 
took their departure from Cape Hecla, and fol¬ 
lowing in the rear, Peary hurried on with all pos¬ 
sible speed, hopeful of reaching the Pole at last. 

For some days the ice was in motion every¬ 
where; but it gradually became quieter, and as 
there was very little wind the traveling was par¬ 
ticularly good. Full of impatience as he tramped 
along, and grudging every moment given to rest, 
Peary dreaded lest he should meet with some ob¬ 
stacle, such as open water or impassable ice, that 
would put an end to the journey northwards. 

Delayed by gales and open water, and driven 
out of his course seventy miles to the eastward, 
Peary was cut off from communication with his 
supporting parties; and finding that he could no 
longer depend upon them, he determined to make 
a dash for the Pole with the party, eight in all, 
and the supplies which he had with him. 

Abandoning everything not absolutely essen¬ 
tial, and bending every energy to set a record 
pace, they traveled thirty miles in ten hours’ 
march. Storms of wind and snow added consid- 


PEARY’S LONG STRUGGLE 187 


erably to the difficulties of the journey, the strain 
of which told severely on both men and dogs. 

The 20th of April brought the weary travelers 
into a region of open leads, bearing north and 
south. Resting here for a few hours, Peary and 
his companions resumed their march at midnight, 
pushing on with feverish haste to lessen the dis¬ 
tance between them and the goal that was luring 
them on. Traveling as fast as they could till 
noon of the next day, they came to a final halt. 

Disappointed at having to stop before the ob¬ 
ject of all his striving had been reached, Peary 
would have liked to make the last dash with only 
one or two of his men; but he dared not do this 
in view of the condition of the ice, and reluc¬ 
tantly he had to confess that once again the prize 
had eluded his grasp. Making observations, he 
found that they were in 87° 6' north latitude, the 
most northerly point that had yet been reached 
by man. 

Warned by the haggard faces of his comrades 
and the skeleton figures of the few remaining 
dogs, Peary saw that no time must be lost in 
turning back. After hoisting a flag from the 
summit of the highest point of land, and leav¬ 
ing a bottle containing a record of the journey, 
the exhausted men turned their backs on the 
Pole, and began the weary march homeward. 

Trying as the outward march had been, the 


188 PEARY’S LONG STRUGGLE 


dangers of the return journey were even greater. 
Besides, there was no longer the excitement of 
possible victory to encourage the men in the face 
of hardships. Killing their dogs for food, and 
breaking up the sledges to provide fires for cook¬ 
ing, the tired and dispirited explorers pushed on 
till they found themselves stranded on an island 
of ice. Was this, then, to be the end of the enter¬ 
prise, and were they to meet death in that cold 
and pitiless sea? Such a fate seemed inevitable. 
But just as they were preparing for the worst, 
two of the Eskimo scouts came hurrying back to 
the camp with the report that, a few miles far¬ 
ther on, the water was covered with a film of 
young ice, and that there was a possibility of 
their being able to cross on snow-shoes. 

It was a desperate chance, but they at once 
prepared to take it; and carefully fixing on their 
snow-shoes, they made the venture, the lightest 
and most experienced Eskimo taking the lead, 
with the few remaining dogs attached to the long 
sledge following, “and the rest of the party 
abreast, in widely extended skirmish line, some 
distance behind the sledge.” They crossed in 
silence, holding their breaths, the ice swaying 
beneath them as they skimmed along. What the 
result would be none could tell; but they all felt 
the greatness of their peril. 

Peary himself confesses that this was the first 


PEARY’S LONG STRUGGLE 189 


and only time in all his Arctic experience that he 
felt doubtful as to what would happen. “When 
near the middle of the lead,” he says, “the toe of 
one of my snow-shoes, as I slid forward, broke 
through twice in succession; then I thought to 
myself, ‘This is the finish.’ A little later there 
was a cry from some one in the line, but I dared 
not take my eyes from the steady gliding of my 
snow-shoes. When we stepped upon the firm 
ice on the southern side of the lead, sighs of relief 
from the two men nearest me were distinctly 
audible. The cry I had heard had been from one 
of my men, whose toe, like mine, had broken 
through the ice.” The crossing had been made 
just in time, for, as the travelers looked round 
for a moment before turning their faces south¬ 
ward, they saw that the sheet of ice on which 
they had crossed was in two pieces. The lead 
was widening again. 

All were safely across; but they were not yet 
out of danger. Unable to find a route which 
they might traverse with any degree of safety, 
Peary and his men ascended a high mass of ice 
to have a better view of their surroundings, and 
to look for a way of escape. What they beheld 
from their elevated position might well have 
struck terror into the boldest heart. Before them 
extended such a mass of shattered ice as Peary 
had never seen before and hoped never to see 


190 PEARY’S LONG STRUGGLE 


again, “a confused mass of fragments, some only 
the size of paving-stones, others as large as the 
dome of the Capitol at Washington, but all 
rounded by the terrific grinding they had re¬ 
ceived.” 

Once again death was looking them in the 
face, for it seemed an utter impossibility to find 
a path through that frozen wilderness. But as 
long as they could keep a footing they deter¬ 
mined to struggle on; and stumbling forward at 
every step, bruised and sore, they at last struck 
a better road. They made their way to Britan¬ 
nia Island, and thence to Cape May and Cape 
Bryant. 

The brave party suffered much from want of 
food. For days on end they were on the verge 
of starvation. A hare that was shot gave them 
the first full meal for nearly forty days. With 
snow falling around them, and without tent or 
covering of any kind, they lay down on the 
ground to sleep. 

Waking in the morning as tired and hungry 
as ever, they found the tracks of musk-oxen in 
the snow, and their hopes rose as they endeav¬ 
ored to follow the trail. Sweeping the valley 
with their field-glass, they could see no sign of a 
living thing; but later on they espied several 
black dots at a distance, and knew that they had 
located the herd. Pushing on towards them, 



W f 1C Qr. •<} !> 


THE BLACK AVALANCHE OF THUNDERING BEASTS WAS 
BEARING DOWN ON THEIR ENEMIES 












PEARY’S LONG STRUGGLE 191 


Peary and a companion lay down behind a big 
boulder to rest and gather strength, for they 
dared not risk a shot before they were sure of 
their aim. 

Resolving at last on an attack, the two men 
grasped their rifles, and, rushing out from be¬ 
hind their place of shelter, made straight for the 
animals, now less than two hundred yards away. 
An old bull that was standing guard gave the 
signal to charge, and in a minute the “black ava¬ 
lanche of thundering beasts” was bearing down 
on their enemies. 

Fortunately for Peary his shot went true, and 
the great bull fell dead. The maddened rush 
was stopped; and before the oxen could make 
their retreat over the ridge six of their number 
lay dead upon the frozen ground; and for the 
next few days the party revelled in the delights 
of a continuous feast. 

Fortified by this food they pushed on till they 
reached their ship and safety. Again the final 
goal had eluded them—but soon the victory was 
to be theirs. 


XVI 


THE NORTH POLE CONQUERED 

NDAUNTED by the failure of his pre¬ 
vious attempts through more than twenty 
long years, Peary prepared for still an¬ 
other try at the Pole. The popular interest in 
his expedition was widespread, beginning with 
President Roosevelt himself, for whom Peary’s 
vessel was named. The funds for the venture 
were raised by popular subscription. 

Meanwhile a small flood of “crank” letters 
poured in from all over the country. There was 
an incredibly large number of persons who were 
simply oozing with inventions and schemes, 
which if adopted would insure the discovery of 
the Pole. There were flying machines, subma¬ 
rines, motor cars, motor sledges, and balloons of 
all sorts. One chap, says Peary, proposed that 
“a central soup station” be installed, and that a 
series of hose lines be run thence over the ice so 
that outlying parties could be warmed and invig¬ 
orated with hot soup from the central station. 

“Perhaps the gem of the whole collection was 
furnished by an inventor who desired me to play 
the part of the ‘human cannon ball.’ He would 
not disclose the details of his invention, appar- 

( 192 ) 




© Underwood and Underwood 

THE ROOSEVELT, PEARY’S SHIP, UNDER STEAM, BLOWING A FAREWELL AT 







NORTH POLE CONQUERED 193 


ently lest I should steal it, but it amounted to 
this: If I could get the machine up there, and 
could get it pointed in exactly the right direc¬ 
tion, and could hold on long enough, it would 
shoot me to the Pole without fail. This was 
surely a man of one idea. He was so intent on 
getting me shot to the Pole that he seemed to 
be utterly careless of what happened to me in 
the process of landing there, or of how I should 
get back.” 

Peary adds: “It is a great satisfaction to me 
that this whole expedition, together with the 
ship, was American from start to finish. We 
did not purchase a Newfoundland or Norwegian 
sealer and fix it over for our purposes, as in the 
ease of other expeditions. The Roosevelt was 
built of American timber in an American ship¬ 
yard.” 

Leaving New York in July, 1908, Peary 
hoped to be back in the United States by Oc¬ 
tober, 1909. This was his eighth voyage into the 
Arctic regions, and he meant it to be his last. 
The weary years of battle with snow and ice had 
robbed him of the vigor of youth, and he felt 
that he had reached an age when he must give up 
Arctic enterprise. He must win now, or lose 
forever, the glory for which he had so long toiled 
and struggled. So he laid his plans with a care 
that left nothing to chance. 


194 NORTH POLE CONQUERED 


During the rest of that summer and the early 
fall the gallant ship fought her way steadily 
northward. As the winter stretched forth its 
icy hands to meet them, they struggled through 
one ice floe after another. The ship had power¬ 
ful, low-pressure engines, and in an emergency 
extra steam could be forced into the cylinders 
causing the craft fairly to leap ahead. 

During the worst parts of the journey Cap¬ 
tain Bartlett, who was in charge of the ship, 
spent most of his time in the crow’s nest, the 
barrel lookout at the top of the mainmast. 
Peary would often climb up in the rigging just 
below him, and would hear the captain calling 
encouragingly to his ship as she fought the ice: 

“Rip ’em, Teddy! Bite ’em in two! Go it! 
That’s fine, my beauty! Now—again!’’ 

Again Peary writes: “I think that none of 
the members of the expedition will ever forget 
the 30th of August. The Roosevelt was kicked 
about by the floes as if she had been a foot-ball. 
The game began about four o’clock in the morn¬ 
ing. I was in my cabin trying to get a little 
sleep—with my clothes on, for I had not dared 
remove them for a week. My rest was cut short 
by a shock so violent that, before I realized that 
anything had happened, I found myself on deck 
—a deck that inclined to starboard some twelve 
or fifteen degrees. A big floe, rushing past with 


NORTH POLE CONQUERED 195 


the current, had picked up the grounded berg to 
which we were attached by the hawsers, as if 
that thousand-ton berg had been a toy, and 
dashed it against the Roosevelt and clear along 
her port side, smashing a big hole in the bul¬ 
warks at Marvin’s room. The berg brought up 
against another one just aft of us, and the 
Roosevelt slipped from between the two like a 
greased pig.” 

By the first week in September they had 
reached the point previously picked out for win¬ 
ter quarters, Cape Sheridan, latitude 82° and 
the farthest north which any ship had reached 
under her own steam. 

After wintering at Cape Sheridan, Peary’s 
sledge expedition left the Roosevelt in Febru¬ 
ary, 1909, and started north from Cape Colum¬ 
bia on March 1st. The party comprised seven 
members of the expedition, seventeen Eskimos, 
a hundred and thirty-three dogs, and nineteen 
sledges. 

For several days they were held up by open 
water; but pushing on again, they made splen¬ 
did progress. At various stages in the journey 
the supporting parties returned to the ship. The 
last to leave was that under the command of 
Captain Bartlett, which started on the home- 
trail after the 88th parallel had been reached. 

Having said good-bye to Bartlett, Peary and 


196 NORTH POLE CONQUERED 


Hensen, five Eskimos, with supplies for forty 
days, with the sledges and equipment in the best 
of condition, and with the pick of the dogs, 
pushed on ahead, the commander sparing neither 
himself nor his companions in his eagerness. 

Here and there the ice was irregular, but on 
the whole conditions were good, and no serious 
difficulties arose to bar their advance. Near the 
end of their long journey, however, they had to 
cross a strip of thin ice about a hundred yards 
wide. So thin was it that, says Peary, “As I ran 
ahead to guide the dogs, I was obliged to slide 
my feet and travel wide, bear style, in order to 
distribute my weight. The last two men came 
over on all fours. I watched them from the 
other side with my heart in my mouth—watched 
the ice bending under the weight of the sledges 
and men. As one of the sledges neared the north 
side, a runner cut clear through the ice, and I 
expected every moment that the whole thing, 
dogs and all, would go through the ice and down 
to the bottom. But it did not.” 

Such a disaster would have frustrated all their 
hopes and doubtless their lives as well. But at 
last the Pole grudgingly yielded up its secrets. 

On April 4, the 89th parallel was passed; 
and two days later, Peary, Hensen and his Es¬ 
kimos stood where no human foot had ever been 
before—at the Pole itself. 


NORTH POLE CONQUERED 197 


“East, west, and north had disappeared for 
us. Only one direction remained and that was 
south. Where we were, one day and one night 
constituted a year, a hundred such days and 
nights constituted a century.” The sun passed 
around them in an unending circle as it rose or 
dipped against the horizon. 

For thirty hours the explorer and his party 
remained at this bleak, frozen extremity of the 
world, which did not differ in appearance from 
the icy surface over which they had traveled. 
During their stay Peary made observations, de¬ 
posited records, and took photographs. Leav¬ 
ing again on the day following, they arrived at 
the Roosevelt on the 27th; and a few months 
later all the members of the party returned in 
safety to America, with the exception of Pro¬ 
fessor Ross G. Marvin, who had met his death by 
drowning. 

The Pole had thus been conquered. The 
journey was accomplished without experiencing 
one serious interruption on the march, thanks 
to Peary’s exceedingly careful planning. 

There was only one risk against which there 
could be no guarantee of safety. He could not 
control the forces of Nature; and he had just to 
take his chance. At any moment the ice, which 
appeared as solid as granite, might break up with 
a crack and engulf the party traveling on its 


198 NORTH POLE CONQUERED 


surface. But for once Peary enjoyed good for- 
tune. 

On the homeward journey, as well as on 
the outward run, the pace was more rapid than 
they had even dared to hope; and the feelings oi 
all were well expressed by one of the Eskimos, 
in his quaint way: “The devil is asleep or having 
trouble with his wife, or we should never have 
come back so easy.” 

From a scientific standpoint the soundings 
which Peary took in the neighborhood of the 
Pole are of much importance. At a short dis¬ 
tance from the land, between 83° and 84° north 
latitude, he found a depth of 110 fathoms. At 
the 85th degree the water was much deeper, a 
sounding of 825 fathoms being obtained; while 
five miles from the Pole itself the depth was 
found to be 1500 fathoms, with no bottom. From 
these soundings it is argued that what is known 
as the Continental Shelf—that is, the shallow 
plateau extending over a varying distance from 
the edge of the coast-line—deepens rapidly in 
the Arctic Ocean. 

One other sensational fact must be chronicled 
in connection with Peary’s achievement. Five 
months after the date of discovery, the news of 
the great event was proclaimed to the world 
in a brief message despatched from New¬ 
foundland. As it flashed across the wires of the 


NORTH POLE CONQUERED 199 


American continent and was cabled to the far¬ 
thest corners of the earth, Peary knew that it 
would send a thrill into many a heart. But he 
was not then aware that just a week earlier the 
honor which he chronicled had been claimed by 
a fellow-countryman of his own! 

The situation was an extraordinary one—two 
explorers within one week claiming to have ac¬ 
complished the unrivalled feat of reaching the 
North Pole. It seemed as if fate had once more 
been unkind to Peary, and had robbed him of 
the honor for which he had so manfully striven; 
for, if the story of the other claimant, Dr. Fred¬ 
erick A. Cook, was to be believed, he had planted 
the flag of the United States at the Pole exactly 
a year before it had been reached by Peary. 

Who was this Dr. Cook, and how was it that 
he had accomplished this remarkable feat with¬ 
out taking the public into his confidence and 
telling them what he intended to do? Nobody 
had heard of his expedition; very few knew any¬ 
thing of the man himself. 

According to his own statements, Cook had 
long entertained the ambition to lead an expedi¬ 
tion to the Pole; and it was while he was engaged 
in hunting in the northern latitudes that the op¬ 
portunity came to him. On July 4, 1907, he 
left New York in a schooner belonging to Brad¬ 
ley, a wealthy gentleman devoted to the hunt- 



200 NORTH POLE CONQUERED 


ing of big game. Late in the same year the 
schooner arrived at the limit of navigation in 
Smith Sound, and the conditions seeming fav¬ 
orable, the “happy thought” occurred to Cook 
that he might make a dash northwards. They 
were then at a point 700 miles from the Pole. 
The problem was discussed with Bradley, who 
generously volunteered to land from the yacht 
food, fuel, and other necessary supplies. “The 
opportunity was too good to be lost, “says Cook, 
“and we therefore returned to Etah to prepare 
for the new quest.” 

Starting with this plausible introduction, Cook 
proceeded to relate in detail the journey over a 
moving sea of ice, until he and his companions 
found themselves, “on April 21st, in latitude 89° 
59' 46". The Pole, therefore, w r as in sight. At 
last,” continues Cook, “the flag had been raised 
to the coveted breezes of the North Pole. The 
latitude was 90°, where all meridians meet; the 
temperature was minus 36°. North, east, and 
west had vanished. It was south in every direc¬ 
tion.” 

Naturally, the story was received with a good 
deal of doubt. Peary, full of wrath at the as¬ 
sertions of the pretender, declared that Cook had 
never been near the Pole, and that there was not 
a word of truth in his story. But for a time 
many people believed in him. He was feted and 


NORTH POLE CONQUERED 201 


honored, declaring all the while that when his 
records came to be examined by experts his claim 
would be established. 

By-and-by his evidence was produced; but it 
did not bear examination; and almost as sud¬ 
denly as he had appeared before the gaze of the 
world, Cook disappeared from the scene, leav¬ 
ing Peary to the full enjoyment of his glory. 

In marked contrast to the hesitation with 
which Cook’s story had been received, the brief 
messages from Peary gave rise to no doubt what¬ 
ever. Here was a man who had given the best 
years of his life to the solution of the mystery, 
and who, though baffled again and again, had 
refused to accept defeat. And now, when he an¬ 
nounced that, after twenty-three years of effort, 
he had reached the goal, and produced his papers, 
his claim abundantly supported by proof was 
accepted without question. 


XVII 


THE LURE OF THE SOUTH POLE 

I T is a long and a wonderfully thrilling story 
that is bound up with the history of Arctic 
exploration; the record of adventure in the 
regions of the South Pole is neither so long nor 
so rich in incident. 

Not only has the South Pole failed to stir the 
public imagination to anything like the same 
extent as the North, but its history begins at a 
much later period. It is only within compara¬ 
tively recent times that any attempt has been 
made to reach the southern extremity of the 
earth’s axis. Voyages of discovery in the Arctic 
were encouraged by the prospect of opening up 
new routes for commerce; and in this way were 
established the prosperous seal and whale fish¬ 
eries. The South, on the other hand, has held 
out no such inducements. 

Before the days of Captain James Cook, who 
may be regarded as the pioneer of South Pole 
navigators, there was a widespread belief in the 
existence of a great Southern continent. A few 
attempts had been made to penetrate into the 
unknown region, but little knowledge was ob¬ 
tained regarding it. 


( 202 ) 




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V\Z£ of ‘Magellan 

\ Falkland IV< 
v British', y 


AMERICA# 

\ „ ,/H, 

\ Cape Horn 


1 Charcots farthest west 
' f /+|909jO / 

-'FT “Cofc-cr^/ - 

’>17 74 P/>tjrrC~^ "nnO 


Staten A 


^eterf.^ / 

it*; Bellingshausen 
* < tL[82t \ y ' 
A-Gerleiche 
7-T 1898 X 
Charcot 1909 , 
LOUBfY L^S&C' 


Bounty I, 


Charcot 
_ 4-190^.1 

, ORA 


htipodes t. 


Lytt/eton 


South \jA 
.Shetland 
Islands . \ 
,kjo/d\ 

* South o 

* Orkney 
k 1 s!anas 


\Join vi/fe ft 

\ -f Nordens 
> 1903 


^Dunedin/ ''•v v 

'fc ^Stewart l.*C^ //f 
N E W .. Auckland /? 

Z E A LA N D 


7 Route— ~ —ScottJ. 


iCape Adare 


Emerald / 


Ba//enyl s jd 


'^-Oominioi 


0 Cape North 


+ Weddell 
_1823 — 


a Macquarie 7 


VtCTORf 

LAND 


vS'oko' 1 W/ P!at ^ - 

Y'.-^7f 4 N Amundsen 14 -17 D ec.1911 
Scott 17 th Jan. 1912 
SOUTH 

POLE -_ 


Iruce 

.1904^ 

iCOATS 


s. MAGNETIC POLE 


Wilkes 

1840 


1840 


Bouvet f. 


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KNOX > 
LAND i 


v KAISER WILHELM II 
LAND/ 

rygalsk>^%< 

J903 


y .-t-Nares 

1874- 


MAP OF SOUTH POLAR REGIONS 
























































LURE OF SOUTH POLE 


203 


In 1567 the governor of Peru despatched an 
expedition to explore the “Terra Australis In¬ 
cognita;” and a second expedition from the same 
country, commanded by Querios, followed in 
1605. After exploring in the southern Pacific, 
this navigator returned with a glowing story of 
the richness and beauty of the lands he had seen. 

Other expeditions, one from Amsterdam in 
1598, and another from France in 1675, sailed 
with the object of making discoveries; but it was 
not until the celebrated voyag of James Cook 
that the curtain began to be lifted. 

Sailing the southern seas in the Endeavour in 
1768, Captain Cook proved New Zealand to be 
an island. In 1772 he set sail with the Resolution 
and the Adventure on another expedition. “The 
importance of this voyage,” says Captain R. F. 
Scott, the famous Antarctic explorer, “can 
scarcely be exaggerated. Once and for all the 
idea of a populous, fertile Southern continent 
was proved to be a myth; and it was clearly 
shown that whatever land might exist to the 
South must be a region of desolation, hidden be¬ 
neath a mantle of ice and snow.” Cook’s Far¬ 
thest South was 71° 10', or 1130 geographical 
miles from the South Pole. 

During the forty years immediately following 
Cook’s last voyage the Antarctic seas were un¬ 
disturbed by navigators; but the nineteenth cen- 


204 


LURE OF SOUTH POLE 


tury was only in its infancy when there came a 
revival of interest, and it is since that time that 
we have got to know anything of what lies 
within the Antarctic Circle. 

In 1819 an English sailor named William 
Smith discovered the South Shetlands; and, in 
the same year, Alexander I., Emperor of Russia, 
fired with the spirit of exploration, determined to 
send expeditions simultaneously to the North 
Polar and South Polar regions, and despatched 
two ships to each destination. 

Under the command of Bellinghausen, the 
southern expedition, in the ships Vostok and 
Mirni, crossed the Antarctic Circle in 1820. 
Though they found their progress blocked by 
the ice-packs and did not proceed as far south as 
might have been expected, the enterprise was 
far from fruitless. Bellinghausen discovered 
and named Peter I. Island and Alexander I. 
Island, and returned to Cronstadt, in 1821. 

During this voyage Bellinghausen found a 
fleet of American sealers in the neighborhood of 
the South Shetlands; and it was about this time 
that a brisk and profitable whale and sealing in¬ 
dustry sprang up in these waters. While en¬ 
gaged in fishing, the commanders of the vessels 
made several discoveries of importance. These 
are chiefly associated with the names of Wed¬ 
dell, Biscoe, and Balleny. In 1823, Weddell, 


LURE OF SOUTH POLE 


205 


penetrated three degrees farther south than 
Cook, reaching 74° 15' in the sea which now 
bears his name, and brought back with him to 
England the first specimens of the Weddell seal 
ever landed in Europe. John Biscoe, in 1831, 
began a circumnavigation of the Antarctic reg¬ 
ions, discovering Enderby Land, named after 
his employers, the Biscoe Islands, and Graham 
Land. 

The voyage of John Balleny was marked by 
the first disaster in the history of southern ex¬ 
ploration. Sailing, in 1838, with the schooner 
Eliza Scott, 154 tons, and the cutter Sabrina, 
54< tons, Balleny reached the Antarctic Circle in 
the following January, and soon afterwards en¬ 
countered heavy ice. Changing his course to 
the westward, he discovered Balleny Islands, a 
group of volcanic mountains, and a little later 
sighted Sabrina Land. Overtaken by a heavy 
gale, the two tiny vessels were tossed about at 
the mercy of wind and sea, and the Sabrina 
foundered with all on board. 

In 1838, a French expedition, under Captain 
Dumont d’Urville, failed to reach the Antarctic 
Circle, but discovered Louis Philippe Land and 
Joinville Island. 

In 1840, d’Urville, learning while at Hobart 
Town that expeditions were being sent out from 
Britain and America, determined to be in front 


206 


LURE OF SOUTH POLE 


of his rivals. He made a sudden dash south in 
the hope of adding fresh honors to his country’s 
flag and new lands to the map of the world. 

He was to some extent successful. To a 
group of snow-covered mountains, some of 
which rose to a height of 1500 feet, he gave the 
name of Adelie Land; and after sailing for a 
whole day along a vertical cliff of ice rising 130 
feet out of the water, d’Urville concluded that 
there must be land behind such a solid mass, and 
gave it the name of Clarie Coast. 

Sailing on these waters at the same time was 
an American expedition commanded by Com¬ 
modore Wilkes—an expedition which was un¬ 
fortunate from the very beginning. Six vessels 
composed the squadron, wdiich was intended “to 
explore the southern Antarctic to the southward 
of Powell’s group, endeavoring to reach a high 
southern latitude, but taking care not to be ob¬ 
liged to pass a winter there.” It was also to 
“make an attempt to penetrate within the Ant¬ 
arctic region south of Van Diemen’s Land.” 

The expedition was as ill adapted for its task 
as any that ever set out. Its leader, who was 
aware of the drawbacks under which it sailed, 
and of the folly of attempting such service in 
vessels that were not adapted for ice-navigation, 
declared that it had been ordered to go, and go 
it should. 


LURE OF SOUTH POLE 


207 


In the ice-encumbered seas the squadron had 
a rough experience. One of the tiny ships lost 
her rudder, and for three days lay at the mercy 
of the ice; and then, after being repaired as well 
as was possible under the circumstances, re¬ 
turned to Sydney. 

South of the Antarctic Circle Wilkes sighted 
land, to which he gave the name of Wilkes Land. 

In spite of the protests of his officers and the 
advice of his surgeons, the American navigator 
continued to push his way westwards. It was 
only when farther progress became impossible 
and the health of his crews was in a precarious 
condition, due to long exposure to the severity 
of the weather, that he reluctantly decided to 
return to Australia. 

Britain also had a share of this period in Ant¬ 
arctic enterprise. > Two powerful vessels, the 
Erebus , 370 tons, and the Terror, 340 tons, were 
fitted out, and placed under the command of 
Captain James Clark Ross, an experienced 
Arctic explorer. Leaving England in 1840, 
this expedition, well equipped for its task, with 
its able commander and enthusiastic crew, ac¬ 
complished more than any other enterprise that 
had preceded it. 

Early in January, 1841, Ross boldly steered 
his two vessels into the dreaded ice-pack. After 
plowing southwards through broken ice for five 


208 


LURE OF SOUTH POLE 


days, he emerged into the open sea now known 
by his name. Sailing westwards, Ross discov¬ 
ered Victoria Land, and followed its mountain¬ 
ous coasts for 500 miles to the south, where they 
terminated in Mounts Erebus and Terror, “the 
former of which was vomiting forth flame and 
lava from a height of 12,000 feet.” 

He then sailed for 300 miles to the eastward 
along the perpendicular face of an ice-barrier 
which rose from 150 feet to 200 feet above sea- 
level. He landed on two volcanic islands devoid 
of vegetation, and sailed within 160 miles of the 
South Magnetic Pole. He sounded and dredged 
in deep water; he studied the temperature of the 
ocean, and with the assistance of Joseph Hooker, 
he investigated the marine animal and plant life 
of the Antarctic; and he described in a vivid 
manner the anxieties, dangers, sufferings, and 
joys which he experienced during his three years 
in those realms of snow and ice and volcanic fire, 
where hailstorms, fogs, and gales alternate with 
brilliant sunshine. 

After this busy period of enterprise, there 
followed a lull in Antarctic effort, the Arctic 
regions receiving more attention, chiefly in con¬ 
sequence of the tragic fate of Sir John Franklin 
and the numerous parties which went in search 
of the missing explorers. But after an interval 
of forty years there came an awakening of in- 


LURE OF SOUTH POLE 


209 


terest, and the expedition of H.M.S. Challenger 
(1873-76), commanded by Captain George 
Nares, was fitted out. Although resulting in 
no new discoveries, the expedition accomplished 
much scientific work, its meteorological observa¬ 
tions and deep-sea soundings being of the most 
valuable character. To the Challenger belongs 
the distinction of being the first steamship to 
cross the Antarctic Circle. 

In 1898, an expedition in the Southern Cross, 
commanded by Carstens Borchgrevink, a young 
Norwegian, was) fitted out by Sir George 
Newnes. Anchoring in Robertson Bay, off Cape 
Adare, Borchgrevink and nine companions 
landed with huts, stores, sledges, and dogs. They 
were the first party to pass a winter on the Ant¬ 
arctic continent. They explored the eastern 
coast of Victoria Land, as far south as Mount 
Terror; and the Great Ice Barrier was followed 
for about 300 miles eastward. 

The Belgian Expedition in the Belgica, under 
Captain de Gerlache, in 1898, experienced many 
dangers and difficulties; but, in spite of all these, 
it was able to show a record of useful work. Soon 
after crossing the Antarctic Circle the tiny ship 
—250 tons only—encountered a severe gale, and 
was run into the ice-pack for shelter. Taking ad¬ 
vantage of the wide lanes that had been opened 
up by the wind, De Gerlache pushed steadily 


210 


LURE OF SOUTH POLE 


southwards, hoping to outdistance all previous 
explorers. 

Accompanying the expedition as surgeon was 
Dr. Frederick A. Cook, of America, who some 
years later claimed to have reached the North 
Pole, He gives a vivid picture of their exper¬ 
iences in the ice. He writes: “It is a cold and 
gloomy region, with constant drizzly fogs. Clear 
weather is a rare exception. Storm, with rain, 
sleet, and snow, is the normal weather condition 
throughout the year. 

“On the 28th we were unable to get a glimpse 
of the sun, and were, in consequence, in doubt 
as to our actual position. In the darkness the 
Belgica pushed into the ice-pack. The noise 
was maddening. Every swell that broke against 
the ship brought with it tons of ice, which were 
thrown against her sides with a thundering 
crash. The wind howled as it rushed past us, and 
came with a force that made us grasp the rails 
to keep from being thrown into the churning 
sea. Occasionally we would try to talk, but 
the deafening noise of the storm, the squeaking 
strains of the ship, and the thumping of the ice 
made every effort at speech inaudible. 

“With our minds raised to a fever-heat of ex¬ 
citement, and with a prospect of striking an ice¬ 
berg at any moment and going to the bottom of 
the sea, we were, to say the least, uncomfortable. 


LURE OF SOUTH POLE 


211 


When we had entered sufficiently into the body 
of the ice-pack, and were surrounded by closely 
packed ice-floes, the sea subsided, and here the 
ship rested for the night.” 

For a whole year the Belgica remained fast 
in the ice, escaping at last from her prison in 
March, 1899, after all the members of the ex¬ 
pedition had suffered greatly from insufficient 
food. 

As navigators became bolder, and penetrated 
farther into the unknown South, they exper¬ 
ienced some of the difficulties and hardships 
that had for so long been the lot of the Arctic 
explorers. 

Under the leadership of Dr. Otto Norden- 
skiold, a nephew of Baron Nordenskiold, the 
famous Arctic explorer, a Swedish expedition 
arrived at the South Shetlands in January, 1902. 
For two years the explorers wintered in a timber 
house on Snow Hill Island in 64° 25' south. 
Crushed in the ice, their vessel, the Antarctic , 
sank; but fortunately there was no loss of life, 
Nordenskiold and his crew being rescued by an 
Argentine gunboat before the relief-boat which 
had been despatched from Sweden reached 
them. 

A German expedition commanded by Captain 
Drvgalski, in the Gauss , discovered Kaiser 
William II. Land, off which, in 1902, the vessel 


212 


LURE OF SOUTH POLE 


went into winter quarters, and returned home in 
the following year. 

Such were the beginnings of Antarctic enter¬ 
prise. 



ICE PRESSURE IN THE WEDDELL SEA 








XVIII 


THE VOYAGE OF THE “SCOTIA” 

T O the names of Weddell and Ross, famous 
Scotsmen who have been previously men¬ 
tioned as explorers of the South Polar 
regions, must be added that of another Scots¬ 
man, Dr. W. S. Bruce, whose work in the Ant¬ 
arctic regions is worthy of high honor. 

The public record of Dr. Bruce begins with 
his voyage to the Antarctic in 1892, when he 
sailed as naturalist on board the Baloena, one of 
a fleet of four Dundee whalers which had set 
out for the Weddell Sea. The main object of 
the expedition was to search for the Bowhead, or 
some similar whale, which was reported to exist 
there. 

Many years earlier, Ross had seen in Erebus 
and Terror Gulf “great numbers of the largest- 
sized black whales lying upon the water in all 
directions,” astonishing him and his men by 
“their enormous breadth.” They had also seen 
a species of whale “greatly resembling, but said 
to be distinct from, the Greenland whale.” It 
was on the strength of these and similar state¬ 
ments that this fleet of vessels was despatched 
to the Antarctic seas. Fitted up with nautical 


m3) 


214 VOYAGE OF THE “SCOTIA” 


and meteorological instruments, the Baloena 
was also equipped for scientific work. 

The usual weather in these regions was en¬ 
countered—fog, sleet, rain, and squalls. Many 
icebergs were met with, some of which were three 
or four miles long, and one, a floating island of 
ice, was thirty miles long. Surface and deep- 
sea temperatures were recorded. Soundings 
were made, and floats were thrown out to test the 
direction and the speed of surface-currents. 

In the frozen waters, where flat-topped ice¬ 
bergs surrounded them on every side, they ex¬ 
perienced a gale which the skipper of the Baloena 
described as the “hardest that ever blew in the 
Arctic or Antarctic.” It was so stiff that for 
ten hours they steamed against it as hard as they 
could, and at the end had made only one knot. 
Any land that was seen was entirely covered 
with snow. The voyage, while valuable from a 
scientific point of view, did not succeed in its 
main purpose; for though many whales were 
seen, they were not worth catching. 

In 1896, Dr. Bruce accompanied the Jackson- 
Harmsworth Expedition to Franz Josef Land, 
acting in the capacity of zoologist. In 1898, he 
again sailed north; and later he joined the Prin¬ 
cess Alice, the Prince of Monaco’s yacht, for 
scientific work in Spitzbergen. 

At last the national expedition to the Ant- 


VOYAGE OF THE “SCOTIA” 215 


arctic for which Dr. Bruce had so long pleaded 
was rendered possible by the assistance of 
friends interested in the enterprise; and, with¬ 
out Government aid of any kind, the Scotia was 
fitted out. She left the Clyde in November, 
1902, and by the end of the following January 
was well advanced in the southern waters. Ex¬ 
ploring in her first season 4000 miles of ocean, 
the Scotia wintered at the South Orkneys, 
where, on the beach at Laurie Island, an observ¬ 
atory was built; and during the winter months 
much valuable investigation into the conditions 
of the Antarctic Ocean was carried on. 

In November the Scotia was able to put to 
sea, the ice having yielded and left a passage. 
After calling at the Falkland Islands, she passed 
on to Buenos Ayres, where some necessary re¬ 
pairs were executed. Here the welcome news 
was received from Scotland that, as further 
funds were available, the voyage might be pro¬ 
longed. Plans were accordingly made for an¬ 
other visit to the south; and before sailing from 
South America, Bruce had the gratification of 
learning that the Argentine Government had 
agreed to take over, as a permanent meteorolog¬ 
ical station, the building which he had erected on 
the South Orkneys. 

After a call at the South Orkneys, where a 
party of six had been left to continue the mete- 


216 VOYAGE OF THE “SCOTIA” 


orological observations during the Scotia's ab¬ 
sence, Bruce made another dash South. On 
March 1st, as told in the Voyage of the Scotia, 
they crossed their “track of the previous year, 
running into clear water, where a year before 
there had been impenetrable ice.” Land was 
sighted on the following day, and “steaming 
towards this, we found it to be a lofty Ice-Bar¬ 
rier, similar to the one discovered by Ross on the 
other side of the Pole. 

“The Barrier stretched in a north-easterly and 
south-westerly direction; but heavy pack-ice pre¬ 
vented a nearer approach than two miles. The 
surface of the great inland ice, of which the 
Barrier w r as the sea-front, seemed to rise up very 
gradually in undulating slopes, and fade away 
in height and distance into the sky. In one place 
there appeared to be the outline of distant hills; 
if so, they were entirely ice-covered, no naked 
rock being visible.” In the certain belief that 
they had discovered a new Antarctic land, Bruce 
gave to it the name of Coats’s Land, in honor of 
his two principal supporters. 

The farthest south reached was latitude 74° V, 
and, in 1904, the Scotia returned home. When 
they arrived in the Clyde in July, a great wel¬ 
come was given to Bruce and his comrades. 
Among others King Edward offered his congrat¬ 
ulations “on the completion of the important * 


VOYAGE OF THE “SCOTIA” 217 

additions to the scientific knowledge and discov¬ 
eries in the south-eastern part of the Weddell 
Sea.” 

The discoveries made were of great value, and 
museums were enriched by the unique collections 
which Bruce brought back with him. He added 
to our knowledge in so many departments of 
science that it would require an expert in each 
department to describe his achievements. It 
may be said that no more enduring work than 
his has been accomplished in the Antarctic seas. 


XIX 


CAPTAIN SCOTT’S EXPEDITION IN 
THE “DISCOVERY” 

A BOUT this time another British expedi¬ 
tion to the Antarctic was organized. A 
specially designed ship, possessing un¬ 
usual strength in her bows, was built at Dundee, 
and named the Discovery —the sixth of that 
name associated with Polar enterprise. The 
command was given to Captain R. F. Scott, an 
officer in the navy, with no experience of either 
Arctic or Antarctic exploration, but with a 
marked capacity for leadership and for any 
enterprise demanding the qualities of courage 
and endurance. 

An uneventful voyage was made to New Zea¬ 
land, and after remaining there for a month the 
Discovery proceeded south, crossing the Ant¬ 
arctic Circle on January 3rd, 1902. Forcing 
her way through the floes, the Discovery had 
every opportunity of displaying her splendid 
qualities, the resistance of the frozen masses 
testing the strength of her bows, and giving the 
voyagers a foretaste of the difficulties which lay 
ahead. 

“The lofty peaks of northern Victoria Land,” 

( 218 ) 




the photogravure portrait published by Messrs. Maull & Fox, 
'7 Piccadilly, London, W. 










CAPTAIN R. F. SCOTT, R.N. 













SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


219 


says Captain Scott, “were succeeded by a com¬ 
paratively low mountainous country, behind 
which a vast ice-cap appeared to rise to greater 
heights. Towards the 78th parallel, the flanking 
ranges of the continent again rose to great alti¬ 
tudes. In all this we had been aided by the most 
astonishingly good weather, instead of the gales, 
thick weather, and snowstorms we had ex¬ 
pected.” 

Steaming along the face of the gigantic Bar¬ 
rier, which sixty years earlier had brought the 
voyage of Ross to an abrupt end, Scott found 
the voyage far from monotonous, something in¬ 
teresting showing itself every few hours. Less 
pack-ice was encountered than was met with by 
Ross, and the Discovery had penetrated almost 
to 150° west longitude before the heavy ice 

barred farther progress. 

In longitude 165° the Barrier was seen to 
trend to the north. There a land of glaciers was 
seen, its higher summits rising to between 2000 
and 3000 feet above the sea. It was named by 
the expedition King Edward VII. Land. 

In 164° west longitude the Discovery was 
brought to a standstill alongside a low part of 
the Barrier; and there preparations were made 
for the ascent of a captive balloon, in order that 
an extended view of the surrounding region 
might be obtained, To Captain Scott fell the 


220 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


honor of being the first to make a balloon as¬ 
cent in the Antarctic regions. Though the ex¬ 
periment yielded no practical addition to their 
knowledge, it afforded a better view of the ice¬ 
fields round about, than was possible from the 
frozen tableland on which they stood. 

Returning to McMurdo Ray, Scott made the 
interesting discovery that Mounts Erebus and 
Terror are on an island. He was able also to 
prove that McMurdo Bay, instead of being a 
bay, as was supposed, was really the opening of 
a strait leading southward between Ross Island 
(the name given by the expedition to the island 
from which Erebus and Terror rise) and the 
mainland. 

Selecting their winter quarters on the extreme 
south of Ross Island, 400 miles farther south 
than any party had ever wintered before, the ex¬ 
pedition erected several huts to serve as stations 
for magnetic and other observations. 

According to the original intention, the Dis¬ 
covery was not to winter in the ice, but to return 
north after landing a small party. Rut a spot 
having been discovered in which the vessel could 
winter with safety, Scott decided that she should 
remain. Thus the entire party were kept to¬ 
gether, and passed the time pleasantly, work 
and entertainment being agreeably blended. 

Before the winter set in, several sledge parties , 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


221 


were despatched in various directions. These 
brought back with them a store of information 
that proved of great service when the journey 
toward the Pole began, some months later. 

One of these parties, climbing a volcanic peak 
rising to a height of 2700 feet, saw the great 
snow-plain of the Barrier stretching apparently 
without limit from east and south-east to south, 
and “curling a long white arm around the is¬ 
land on which they stood.” To the west “the 
same level of snow seemed to run deep into the 
fretted coast-line; and again they could see it 
beyond the high cape which limited the view 
from the ship;” while in the dim distance, south 
of the lofty western ranges, “more snow-cov¬ 
ered peaks appeared.” 

With one of these early excursions over the 
ice a story of disaster is associated. On March 
4, a sledge party, divided into two teams, each 
pulling a single sledge and each assisted by four 
dogs, left the ship. It consisted of four officers 
—Boyds, Koettlitz, Skelton, and Barne—and 
eight men. For the first few days progress was 
exceedingly slow, the snow being soft and the 
pulling, in consequence, heavy. It soon became 
evident that the only chance of making progress 
was to use snow-shoes. As there were only three 
pairs of ski with the party, Royds decided to 
push on towards Cape Crozier, taking with him 


222 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


only two brother-officers, and sending the other 
members of the party back to the ship. They 
separated on the 9th. 

The returning party soon made the unpleas¬ 
ant discovery that, if the advance journey had 
been difficult, it was no easier task to find their 
way back. Overtaken by heavy gales of wind, 
they suffered much from the bitter blasts; and, 
being unaccustomed to these Antarctic condi¬ 
tions, they doubtless imagined their position 
more dangerous than it really was. 

Discussing the situation among themselves, 
they decided to abandon their sledges and push 
on unhampered. Before leaving these, Barne 
impressed upon the men, as strongly as he could, 
the importance of keeping together, as it was 
impossible to distinguish any object at a greater 
distance than ten yards on account of the fall¬ 
ing snow. Two of the men were wearing fur 
boots, and to prevent them from slipping they 
had a companion on each side. Crossing a steep 
slope where it was difficult to obtain a foothold, 
soon after they had left the sledges behind them 
in the snow, one of the men, named Hare, who 
was at the rear of the party, was reported to be 
missing. 

In the violent squall which was then raging, 
it was almost impossible for the men to see one 
another; but an effort was made to find their 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


223 


absent companion, even though at the risk of 
their own lives. Forming themselves into a 
human chain, thev shouted and blew whistles; 
and while these efforts were being made to at¬ 
tract the attention of Hare, another of the men, 
Evans, disappeared just as suddenly and myster¬ 
iously as the other. He had stepped back on to a 
smooth piece of ice, and the next moment he had 
fallen and was out of sight. 

The situation was becoming worse instead of 
better. Alone on the terrible mountain of snow 
and ice, their ranks reduced by these sudden dis¬ 
appearances, the little party were in a sad plight. 
What was to be done? It was a moment for 
prompt action, and Barne immediately resolved 
upon a plan. 

Believing that the slope down which Evans 
had vanished was a short one, the officer cau¬ 
tioned his men to remain where they were, while 
he himself deliberately followed in the track of 
the missing man. It was not long before he 
discovered that he had made a serious mistake. 
The slope, instead of terminating as he had ex¬ 
pected, increased in steepness; and almost be¬ 
fore he had realized what was happening, he 
was sliding at a tremendous pace down the face 
of the bare and slippery ice. The mad rush 
ended at last in a bed of soft snow; and rising 
up to examine his surroundings, Barne was as- 


224 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


tonished to find Evans unharmed within a few 
feet of him. 

They were just congratulating each other on 
their marvelous escape, when another figure shot 
quickly through the gloom, coming to rest at 
their feet. This was Quartley, who, following 
Barne’s example, had slipped over the edge of 
the slope to discover the cause of his absence, 
and had descended in the same swift, dangerous 
manner. 

It was utterly useless to think of attempting 
to return to their companions by the way they 
had descended; and it was only when they looked 
around for some other path that they discovered 
how narrow had been their escape from a terrible 
death. Only a few paces from the spot at which 
their flight had ended they found that the slope 
stopped suddenly at the edge of a steep preci¬ 
pice, “beyond which they could see nothing but 
the clouds of whirling snow.” As they stood re¬ 
coiling “from this new danger, on the patch of 
soft snow which had saved them from it, a yelp¬ 
ing dog flew past them, clawing madly at the 
icy slope, and disappeared forever into the 
gloom.” 

Bewildered by the awful dangers hedging 
them round, the three men stood huddled to¬ 
gether; and it was only when the biting blasts 
had chilled them to the bone that they realized 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


225 


the necessity of action, if they were to avoid 
freezing to death. Scarcely conscious of their 
movements in the whirling storm, they slowly 
made their way to the right along the cliff, and 
gradually came in sight of the sea lying far be¬ 
low. Then they worked their way up the face 
of a cliff, and crouching under some over-hang¬ 
ing rocks, found a temporary shelter from the 
violence of the gale. 

While these three had been doing battle for 
their lives, the situation of the other members of 
the party left standing at the head of the slope 
was scarcely less perilous. Unconscious of the 
fate of their companions, and unable to pene¬ 
trate the gloom that enveloped them, they could 
only stand and wait, shouting with all their 
might whenever a lull in the storm gave a chance 
of their voices being heard. No response com¬ 
ing to their repeated calls, and their leader fail¬ 
ing to return, they realized that, as they could 
do nothing to render aid, they must think of sav¬ 
ing themselves. 

Striking out in the direction which they sup¬ 
posed led to the ship, the six men walked slowly 
along in single file, one called Wild leading. In 
this manner they proceeded along a slippery 
slope till they reached a valley. Seeing a preci¬ 
pice beneath his feet, the leader came to a sud¬ 
den halt on the very edge of the cliff, springing 


226 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


back with a cry of warning. Checking them¬ 
selves just in time, his companions dug their 
heels into the slippery surface and came to a 
halt, all except a man named Vince, who was 
wearing fur boots and could obtain no grip on 
the ice. In a flash he was over the face of the 
precipice, and out of sight and reach of the 
others. 

Saddened by this calamity, the men turned 
away to renew their desperate struggle for life. 
Beginning to ascend a steep slope, which seemed 
to offer the only path to safety, they toiled pain¬ 
fully up the treacherous rock, where one slip 
would have meant certain death. How they 
made their way to the top they could not tell; 
but at last the terrible nightmare was over, and 
once more they stood on safe ground. Their 
troubles were not yet at an end, but the worst 
was past; and they eventually reached the ship 
in an exhausted condition, exactly a week after 
they had left her with their comrades who had 
left them so mysteriously. 

Laboring under strong excitement, the men 
gave an account of what had happened. A 
search-party was immediately despatched under 
the leadership of Armitage; and as there was 
just the possibility that Vince, in falling over the 
cliff, might have landed on some projecting 
fragment of sea-ice, a whaling-boat, with Lieu- - 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


227 


tenant Shackleton and ten men, set off to search 
the coast. 

Barne, Evans, and Quartley were brought 
safely back; but no trace of Hare or Vince could 
be found; and although another party went out 
to continue the search, it met with no better 
success. 

On the following day an extraordinary thing 
happened. A solitary figure was seen slowly 
approaching the ship, and this turned out to be 
Hare. When he had recovered from his exhaus¬ 
tion, he told his story. Finding that he could 
not walk in his fur boots with any degree of 
safety, he determined to return to the sledges and 
change into leather boots. Shouting this inten¬ 
tion to his companions in front, he believed that 
they had heard and understood. 

In the blinding storm he lost his way. Sitting 
down for shelter under some rocks he fell asleep, 
and on awaking found himself covered with 
snow. Recognizing Crater Hill, he was able to 
find his way back to the ship. He was none the 
worse for his long exposure of thirty-six hours, 
though it was difficult to persuade him that he 
had slept so long. He was under the impression 
that he had returned to the Discovery the day 
after parting from his companions. 

With the return of spring, the preparations 
for the great work of exploration that lay ahead 


228 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


were rapidly pushed forward. By means of 
sledging, vast tracts of the Arctic ice-fields had 
been covered. Now, for the first time in the 
history of Antarctic exploration, the same 
method of travel was about to be adopted on an 
extensive scale. Scott, in undertaking the task 
and adapting himself to the circumstances of the 
Southern regions, revealed striking qualities of 
resource. No detail was overlooked; the prepa¬ 
rations were of the most careful and complete 
character; and before the exploring party left 
the ship, a depot towards the south had been es¬ 
tablished on the ice. 

The great march into the unknown began in 
November; Scott, Shackleton, and Wilson start¬ 
ing off with four sledges and nineteen dogs. It 
was a difficult and hazardous journey. Much 
of the ground had to be covered three times, the 
loads, until they were lightened by the establish¬ 
ment of a depot to meet the needs of the return 
journey, being too heavy to drag over the sur¬ 
face of the soft snow. The party was delayed, 
too, by heavy snow-storms and trouble with the 
dogs, all of which gradually weakened and died. 
In spite of hardships, however, the party pushed 
steadily southwards. 

Throughout the long and trying march Scott 
maintained his buoyant cheerfulness, making 
light of the difficulties and facing the dangers 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


229 


with a stout heart. Within a fortnight after 
leaving the ship they were nearly up to the 79th 
parallel, and therefore farther south than any 
one had been before. “We are already beyond 
the utmost limit to which man has been,” we find 
Scott writing in his diary, not without some 
pride and satisfaction natural in the circum¬ 
stances; “each footstep will be a fresh conquest 
of the great unknown.” 

Towards the end of the month we find this 
entry in the diary: “Before starting to-day (25th 
November) I took a meridian altitude, and to 
my delight found the latitude to be 80° 1. All 
our charts of the Antarctic regions show a plain 
white circle beyond the 80th parallel. It has 
been our ambition to get inside that white space, 
and now we are there the space can no longer be 
a blank; this compensates for a lot of trouble.” 

On December 2, Scott notices “the crack¬ 
ing of the snow crust; sometimes the whole team 
with the sledges get on an area that cracks as 
sharply and as loudly as a pistol-shot, and this 
is followed by a long-drawn sigh as the area 
sinks. When this has happened the terrified 
dogs sprang forward with their tails between 
their legs, and heads screwed round as though 
the threatened danger was behind. Indeed, it 
gave me rather a shock the first time—it was so 
unexpected, and the sharp report was followed 



230 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


by a distinct subsidence. Though probably one 
dropped only an inch or two, there was a feeling 
of insecurity which was not pleasant.” 

To the right of the travelers, as they doggedly 
pushed to the south, new land appeared in sight 
at a distance of about fifty miles. So far as they 
were able to judge, this consisted of a magnifi¬ 
cent range of mountains, some of them rising to 
a height of over 10,000 feet. They saw no trace 
of volcanoes. 

By the beginning of December the struggle 
had become considerably harder. Several of the 
dogs were practically useless, and the others 
were working only with a great effort. Unless 
the explorers pulled hard themselves they could 
make no progress; and it was with difficulty that 
they made even four miles a day. One day they 
covered only two miles. 

By December 30, the little party had reached 
latitude 82° 17' south, and there they were com¬ 
pelled, by failing provisions, to stop. They 
were unable to reach the land owing to a great 
chasm in the ice; but they had already performed 
a wonderful feat, having surpassed all Antarctic 
records, and penetrated to within 463 miles of 
the Pole. To the highest peaks in the great 
range of mountains, trending south-eastward in 
the distance, names were given. One was called 
Mount Markham and another Mount Long- ' 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


231 


staff, the former, about 15,000 feet, being the 
highest of the group. 

The exploring party reached the Discovery on 
February 3, having plodded for ninety-three 
days, as Scott has put on record, “with ever- 
varying fortune, over a vast snow-field, and 
slept beneath the fluttering canvas of a tent. 
During that time we had covered 960 miles. If 
we had not achieved such great results as at one 
time we had hoped for, we knew at least that we 
had striven and endured with all our might.” 

During the absence of the sledging party, the 
members of the expedition who had been left on 
the ship had not been idle. Parties had been at 
work in various directions exploring the neigh¬ 
borhood, thus adding to their knowledge of their 
surroundings. 

Led by Armitage, a party had climbed the 
great Ferrar Glacier which descended from the 
western mountains; and owing to the treacherous 
nature of the snow-slopes over which they were 
traveling, Armitage nearly lost his life. 

Describing the incident later, Armitage said 
that while crossing the smooth ice he suddenly 
became conscious that he was taking a dive; then 
he felt a violent blow on his right thigh, and all 
the breath seemed to be shaken out of his body. 
Instinctively he thrust out his elbows and 
knees, and then saw that he was some way 


232 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


down a crevasse, which seemed to be about four 
feet wide at that point, and broader to right and 
left; below it widened into a huge, fathomless 
cavern. Skelton threw down to him the end of 
an Alpine rope with a bowline in it. Slipping 
this over his shoulders, Armitage was hauled up 
with a series of jerks and landed on the surface, 
feeling, as he said, as though he had been cut in 
two, and with not a gasp left in him. 

The arrival of the relief-ship, Morning, was 
heartily welcomed by the expedition; and when 
she sailed for home several members of the Dis¬ 
covery's crew returned with her. Shackleton, 
whose health had given way under the exposure 
of the great sledge journey, but who had per¬ 
sisted in sticking to his post, was an unwilling 
passenger. 

For another winter the Discovery was firmly 
locked in the ice. The time passed happily and 
uneventfully, and on August 21, Scott was 
able to write: “Our second long Polar night has 
come to an end. I do not think there is a soul 
on board the Discovery who would say that it 
has been a hardship. All disappointment at our 
enforced detention has passed away, and has 
been replaced by a steady feeling of hopeful¬ 
ness.” Throughout the season scientific obser¬ 
vations were carried out, and many new and in¬ 
teresting facts were discovered. 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


233 


Sledging operations began with the return of 
spring, the most important of the journeys being 
that led by Scott into the western mountains. 
An advance-party, which went out to find a new 
route to the Eerrar Glacier, placed on it a depot 
in readiness for the greater expedition over the 
ice-cap. 

Scott started out in September with four 
sledges; but a week later, when a height of over 
6000 feet had been reached, the sledges broke 
down owing to the runners giving way, and the 
party reluctantly returned to the ship. On the 
26th they made a fresh start. The “wretched 
runners,” as Scott described them, again caused 
trouble; but while these difficulties were “very 
annoying,” Scott was determined to push on, 
even if they had to carry their loads. More than 
one blizzard was encountered as they ascended 
the icy slope of the glacier, the worst attacking 
them w T hen they were about half-way up the 
slope. Almost at a run, they hurried to the top 
in the hope of finding a suitable camping-ground. 

Already most of the party were frost-bitten 
in the face, and it was evident that unless a 
shelter was speedily found it would fare badly 
with them all. “I shall not in a hurry forget the 
next hour,” Scott tells us. “We went from side 
to side, searching vainly for a patch of snow, 
but everywhere finding nothing but the baie, 


234 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


blue ice. The runners of the sledges had split 
again so badly that we could barely pull them 
over the rough surface; we dared not leave them 
in the thick drift, and every minute our frost¬ 
bites were increasing. At last we saw a white 
patch, and made a rush for it. It proved to be 
snow indeed, but so ancient and wind-swept that 
it was almost as hard as the solid ice itself. 
Nevertheless, we knew that it was this or noth¬ 
ing; and in a minute our tents and shovels were 
hauled off the sledges, and we were digging for 
dear life.” 

It was no easy task erecting tents on such a 
thin patch of snow and in such a storm as was 
then blowing; but after the canvas had been 
several times blown down, the work was accom¬ 
plished and the slender coverings stood upright. 
Into them the tired men crept, glad to find some 
shelter from the raging storm. They did not, 
however, bargain for such a long stay as that 
to which they were doomed. 

For a full week the explorers were confined 
to their tents; and Scott confesses that it was the 
most miserable week he ever spent. Almost 
without a lull the gale continued to rage with 
extraordinary fierceness; and for twenty-two 
hours out of each twenty-four the men lay in 
their sleeping-bags, enveloped continuously in 
a thick mist of driving snow. 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


235 


Tired of their long and weary imprisonment, 
Scott and his companions resumed their march, 
though they could scarcely see half-a-dozen 
yards in front of them. They felt, however, that 
anything was better than inaction, and preferred 
to risk the chasms and crevasses that threatened 
them at every step rather than remain impris¬ 
oned in their tents. 

It was heavy work trudging slowly over the 
ice, exposed all the time to the stinging fury of 
the wind; and it told so severely on several mem¬ 
bers of the party that they were compelled to 
return to the vessel. “We all have deep cracks 
in our nostrils and cheeks,” Scott wrote in his 
diary, “and our lips are broken and raw; our 
fingers also are getting into a shocking state.” 

By November 30, they had finished their last 
outward march. “Thank Heaven!” is the entry 
in the leader’s record; and he goes on to add: 
“Nothing has kept us going during the past 
week but the determination to carry out our 
original intention of going to the end of the 
month. Here, then, tonight we have reached 
the end of our tether, and all we have done is 
to show the immensity of this vast plain. 

“The scene about us is the same as we have 
seen for many a day, and shall see for many a 
day to come—a scene so wildly and awfully deso¬ 
late that it cannot fail to impress one with 


236 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


gloomy thoughts. We see only a few miles of 
ruffled snow bounded by a vague, wavy horizon; 
and we know that beyond that horizon are hun¬ 
dreds, and even thousands, of miles which can 
offer no change to the weary eye. On this vast 
expanse we know that there is neither tree nor 
shrub, nor any living thing, nor even inanimate 
rock—nothing but a terrible, limitless expanse 
of snow. It has been so for countless years, and 
it will be so for countless more. And we, little 
human insects, have started to crawl over this 
awful desert, and are now bent on crawling 
back again.” 

Little wonder that these brave men were glad 
to turn their faces once more towards the ship, 
determined to reach her with all speed. By 
pluck and endurance they had dragged their 
sledges a distance of 278 miles from the ship, 
over a surface of frozen snow 9000 feet above 
sea-level; and on December 1, they started to 
retrace their steps. 

The wind was now behind the travelers, but 
new difficulties arose on the march. Slipping 
and falling, and plunging blindly into yawning 
chasms, they gradually reduced the distance that 
lay between them and the comfort and safety of 
their vessel, which they reached at last on Christ¬ 
mas Eve. 

The relief-ships, the Morning and the Terra* 


SCOTT’S EXPEDITION 


237 


Nova , reached the expedition a few days later, 
and on February 19, 1904, the Discovery es¬ 
caped from the harbor, where for two years she 
had been locked in the ice. The expedition was 
thus practically at an end; and Scott made his 
way back to New Zealand. 


XX 


SHACKLETON’S FARTHEST SOUTH 

B Y demonstrating the practicability of long 
sledge journeys within the Antarctic 
Circle, Scott had opened up a new field of 
possibilities; and it was inevitable that before 
many years had elapsed another attack, strength¬ 
ened by Scott’s experiences, would be made on 
the frozen route to the South Foie. 

The man to make the attempt was Lieutenant 
Ernest Shackleton, afterwards knighted in rec¬ 
ognition of his work of exploration. Serving 
under Scott in the Discovery enterprise, he had 
accompanied his leader on the famous sledge 
journey that had broken all previous records. 
He had thus gained a thorough knowledge of 
the conditions of the desolate wastes lying be¬ 
tween civilization and the extremity of the Frigid 
South; and by actual acquaintance with the dan¬ 
gers of traveling over the frozen surface, he 
knew what to expect. 

An expedition under Shackleton’s command 
was organized, and after being visited by King 
Edward and Queen Alexandra, the Nimrod 
sailed from England in August, 1907. In its 
trying experiences and numerous adventures 

( 238 ) 





© Underwood and Underwood 


SIR ERNEST SHACKLETON 







■I | 

, 
































FARTHEST SOUTH 


239 


this expedition bore a closer resemblance to Arc¬ 
tic explorations than any of its predecessors. 
The hardships of ice-travel, the fatigues of long 
marches, the daily nearness of death in the dan¬ 
gers that surrounded them, the battles with the 
pitiless blizzards, the sufferings caused by hun¬ 
ger—these are all familiar features in the long 
story of Arctic enterprise. 

Shackleton was thwarted in his ambition to 
reach the Pole; but he failed not from any lack 
of courage or effort, but simply because it would 
have been madness to go on. The food was prac¬ 
tically gone, and the nearest depot lay miles 
away. Had Shackleton and his companions not 
been prudent as well as brave they might have 
reached the Pole, but it is certain they would 
never have come back to tell the tale. 

Leaving England for its voyage into the Ant¬ 
arctic regions, the expedition under Shackleton 
had before it every prospect of success. Its 
chances of getting close to the Pole were cer¬ 
tainly brighter than those of the Discovery . As 
we have already seen, Scott had no experience 
of Polar exploration, and in consequence much 
of his work was experimental. Shackleton, 
having been a member of Scott’s party, had prof¬ 
ited by its experiences. He was, therefore, able 
to start out with everything in his favor. 

In its equipment the expedition differed but 


240 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


little from its predecessor. It made a new de¬ 
parture, however, in using Manchurian ponies 
and a motor-car, though neither experiment 
met with the success anticipated. 

After calling at New Zealand, according to 
the usual custom of southern voyagers, the 
Nimrod left Lyttleton on January 1, 1908, 
and had not proceeded very far before she met 
with severe weather. Knocked about by wind 
and sea, the little vessel began to leak badly, 
necessitating anxious work at the pumps for 
some considerable time. Passing into clearer 
weather, the expedition was soon among the 
floating masses of ice, and entering Ross Sea, 
proceeded along the edge of the Great Ice- 
Barrier. 

When they reached McMurdo Sound, winter 
quarters were selected at a spot only twenty 
miles from the bay in which the Discovery had 
passed a couple of winters. With as little de¬ 
lay as possible the necessary stores and equip¬ 
ment were transferred to the land, in order that 
the Nimrod might be able to return north be¬ 
fore the season was too far advanced. The 
work was accomplished in good time, in spite of 
blizzards and other drawbacks; and on Febru¬ 
ary 22, the ship steamed away, leaving the ex¬ 
ploring party to pass the long night on the lonely 
coast, and to prepare for the task awaiting them 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


241 


when the brightening days should finally come 
to their aid. 

Shackleton and his men found the time pass 
pleasantly enough, for there was a variety of 
occupations to engage their attention. One 
party, for example, climbed the long and slip¬ 
pery slopes of Mount Erebus, being the first 
men to reach its summit. Having accomplished 
the object of their climb, they descended 5000 
feet in the remarkably short space of four hours 
by sliding down the snowy surface. 

The coming of spring witnessed a period of 
much activity. The great event towards which 
all the preparations led up was the hazardous 
journey to the Pole. But before this expedition 
into the depths of the frozen wilderness was be¬ 
gun, it was necessary to make preliminary trial 
trips; provisions had to be laid along the ice¬ 
bound route; and the ponies and dogs needed 
training in the work required of them. 

At last everything was ready. On October 
28, the southern party, consisting of Shackle- 
ton, Dr. Marshall, Adams and Wild, with pro¬ 
visions for ninety-one days, and accompanied 
by a supporting party carrying provisions for 
fourteen days, turned their backs on the winter 
quarters at Cape Royds, and began their long 
journey over the blizzard-swept desert. 

Brilliant sunshine and a cloudless sky smiled 


242 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


upon the southward-bound travelers as they 
said good-bye to their companions. But it was 
not long before trials in one form or another 
came to test the mettle of which they were made. 
One of the ponies became lame; and this caused 
some delay at Hut Point, where the first camp 
was made. 

When they left Hut Point, the prospects 
seemed brighter, the weather remaining fine, and 
the ponies pulling with vigor. But two days 
after leaving the camp a gusty wind, from which 
those regions are never entirely free, bore down 
upon the little party with such violence as to 
compel them to halt. The blizzard continuing 
to make traveling impossible, Shackleton and 
his companions had to content themselves with 
a couple of biscuits each for lunch, in order that 
the delay might not make an inroad upon their 
food-supply, which, with careful management, 
might last a hundred and ten days. 

When the journey was resumed other dan¬ 
gers were encountered, not the least of these 
being the dangerous character of the great plain 
over which they were making their way. Cov¬ 
ered with snow, the plain was apparently level 
and comparatively easy to traverse; but closer 
acquaintance with it revealed the terrifying fact 
that underneath the innocent-looking surface of 
snow lay numerous crevasses. To avoid these, 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


243 


unceasing watchfulness had to be exercised. 
Once or twice the escapes from death were noth¬ 
ing short of marvelous. One of the ponies led 
by Adams suddenly disappeared up to its middle 
in one of these concealed traps, and it was only 
after considerable difficulty and danger to the 
others, that man and pony were rescued from 
certain death. 

Depot A was reached on November 15. 
Taking part of the stores awaiting them there, 
the travelers resumed their way southwards. 
One day was very much like another as they 
trudged over the frozen waste. Leaving their 
sleeping-bags soon after five in the morning, 
they had to prepare breakfast and make prepa¬ 
rations for the day’s journey, so that it was 
nearly eight o’clock before they were able to get 
on the march. 

Much of the traveling had to he done in single 
file, each man taking his turn at leading, and 
thus forming a kind of path for his fellows. 
Camp was usually pitched about six. Then, 
sitting down to the evening meal round the stove 
inside the tent, the four explorers enjoyed the 
rest which they had so well earned. 

Reaching Depot B, in latitude 81°, they left 
some provisions for the homeward journey, and 
killed one of the ponies, as fresh meat was re¬ 
quired for the depot and to carry with them. 


244 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


In addition, the food-supply of the animals was 
becoming seriously reduced in quantity. 

Marking the spot at which the stores had been 
left, they made a new start to the southward, 
the three ponies now doing the work of four, and 
pulling splendidly over the gradually improving 
surface. Soon after they left the depot, new 
land appeared to the south—a range of ice-cov¬ 
ered mountains, upon which the eye of man had 
never before dwelt. Something like awe pos¬ 
sessed the travelers as these snow-clad heights 
rose, white and majestic, in the distance. The 
pleasure of the discovery was, however, lessened 
by the fear that, as the trend of the mountains 
was to the south-east, there was the possibility 
of their blocking the passage to the south, and 
thus forcing the travelers to find some way up 
their steep and slippery heights. 

The 26th was a memorable day with the little 
party, for they then passed the “Farthest South” 
previously reached by man, and at night found 
themselves in latitude 82° 18' 30" south. Still 
pushing on their lonely way, “the tiny black 
specks,” as Shackleton described himself and his 
companions, “crawling slowly and painfully 
across the white plain,” found once more a 
treacherous surface into which the ponies sank 
from time to time. 

Reaching Depot C on the 28th, they shot 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


245 


another of the ponies. The halt there was brief, 
and on the four brave men went. Steadily they 
were making their way south, accomplishing a 
good march each day, in spite of many difficul¬ 
ties. They had covered over 300 miles due south 
in less than a month. This was distinctly en¬ 
couraging. 

By the 1st of December the two remaining 
ponies were almost exhausted; in addition, they 
were suffering from snow-blindness, and one of 
them had to be shot. A day or two later, cre¬ 
vasses once more threatened life and hindered 
progress, the men being sometimes close up to 
them before the danger was discovered. One 
false step would have flung them into the “blue- 
black depths,” and brought the expedition to a 
sudden end. To get the sledges over these open¬ 
ings was a task of no little difficulty; but by re¬ 
ducing their loads, and returning for what had 
been left behind, it was successfully accom¬ 
plished. One enormous chasm, of about 80 feet 
wide and 300 feet deep, lay right across their 
route, making a detour necessary. 

Leaving the ice of the Barrier, Shackleton 
and his companions began the ascent of the 
great glacier, climbing Mount Hope in order to 
see what lay beyond the mountains. 

On the 7th the party lost their last pony. In 
his diary for that day Shackleton has put on 


246 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


record that the crevasses were particularly bad, 
and that in the slopes of deep snow the pony 
frequently sank down to his middle. As they 
were marching along, a cry for help suddenly 
broke from the lips of Wild. Rushing to his 
assistance, his companions were horrified to see 
the pony-sledge with the forward end down a 
crevasse, and Wild reaching over the side of the 
gulf and grasping the sledge. 

Wild was speedily rescued, but the pony had 
disappeared; and though they got down on their 
stomachs and looked over into the gulf, nothing 
could be seen of the missing animal; only a 
bottomless pit met their gaze. 

Deprived in this tragic manner of the assist¬ 
ance of their hardy little pony, the travelers 
made the best of the situation. They hitched 
themselves to the pony-sledge, and crept along 
through the maze of crevasses and rotten ice 
until they reached a spot where they could with 
safety pitch their tent and encamp for the night. 
But the finding of such a resting-place was not 
easy. 

Two days after the pony’s disappearance the 
four travelers were still among these yawning 
pits that threatened destruction at every step. 
Slender bridges of snow covered the crevasses 
and concealed the depths beneath. Thus, while 
they thought their footing secure, they might be ' 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


247 


treading a covering which at any minute would 
give way beneath their weight and send them to 
their death. Marshall had an exceedingly nar¬ 
row escape, being saved only by his harness 
after he had disappeared below the level of the 
ice; and, soon afterwards, Adams and Shackle- 
ton had in turn a similar experience and, for¬ 
tunately, a similar escape. 

The conditions, instead of improving, grew 
worse. “ Sharp-edged blue ice, full of chasms 
and crevasses, made a surface that could not be 
equalled for difficulty in traveling.” Often it 
was impossible to drag more than one sledge at 
a time over this sharp and treacherous surface; 
and after pulling one sledge for a mile, they 
would return for the other. This added greatly 
to the day’s toil, and retarded their progress 
to such an extent that one day they covered a 
distance of only three miles. Shackleton tells 
us that this day they were a mass of bruises from 
repeated falls on the sharp ice. 

The 14th provided the travelers with as hard 
a day’s work as they had yet experienced. All 
day long they were steering their way up the 
glacier. Snow had fallen nearly all day, and as 
the temperature was high everything became 
very wet. But there was no standing still, for 
every moment was precious; and after ascend¬ 
ing over 1000 feet, they found themselves 5600 


248 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


feet above the level of the sea. It had been a 
heavy pull, with many falls on the slippery ice; 
and, just before they halted for the night, 
Adams had another wonderful escape, sinking 
through some soft snow and being “held up over 
an awful chasm.” The following day found 
them in latitude 84° 50' south. 

Eager to make all possible haste to reach the 
goal, they decided to travel from this stage on¬ 
wards with as little weight as possible. They 
left behind four days’ food, which Shackleton 
calculated would get them back to the last de¬ 
pot on short rations. They had now traversed 
nearly a hundred miles of crevassed ice, and 
risen 6000 feet on “the largest glacier in the 
world.” 

And so the brave little party fought their 
way farther and farther south, dragging their 
sledges over smooth ice that scarcely gave a hold 
to the feet, struggling all day long against the 
biting wind that stung their faces, cutting steps 
with their ice-axes as they went along, and using 
the long Alpine rope to haul the sledges up the 
precipitous slopes. The courage of the explor¬ 
ers never forsook them, and they continued to 
push ahead. 

Reaching the plateau on the 18th, they con¬ 
tinued to ascend; and, though tired and hun¬ 
gry, worked hard at the sledges. Anxious to 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


249 


make the food eke out as long as possible, they 
limited their daily supplies; and each night, as 
they lay down hungry in their sleeping-bags, 
they dreamt of tempting banquets and of 
tables laden with all that the appetite of man 
could desire. 

Christmas Day found them on the summit 
of the plateau, in forty-eight degrees of frost, 
among drift-snow, and buffeted by a bitter 
wind. For the first time for many days they 
enjoyed the luxury of a good meal, in celebra¬ 
tion of the occasion. 4 ‘We are full to-night,” 
says Shackleton in his diary, “and it is the last 
time we shall be so for many a long day. After 
dinner we discussed the situation, and decided 
to reduce our food still further.” 

Before them lay a long road; they had 570 
miles still to do to get to the Pole and back to 
where they then stood. As they had only one 
month’s food and three weeks’ biscuits, they re¬ 
solved to make each week’s food last ten days, 
and have one biscuit in the morning, three at 
midday, and two at night—an allowance that 
proved quite insufficient for their needs. Before 
many more days had passed, Shackleton and 
his companions were suffering from severe head¬ 
aches, and in their weakened condition they 
suffered intensely from the cold. On the 30th 
a blizzard drove them to the shelter of their 


250 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


sleeping-bags, after they had been but four 

hours on the road; and that day’s travel was 

four miles onlv. 

* 

We find them on January 2, 1909, moving 
with heavy steps through the soft snow, Shack- 
leton’s head giving him trouble all the time. He 
could not bear to think of failure; but he felt 
that he must consider the lives of the men who 
had accompanied him, and that if they went too 
far, it might be impossible for them to get back 
over that terrible surface. 

On the 6th, another blizzard swept down upon 
them; and for the next couple of days they were 
confined to their bags, with the temperature 
ranging from sixty to seventy degrees. When, 
on the 9th, they were again able to step out into 
the open, they recognized that their outward 
march was nearly ended, and that they must 
think of returning. 

Starting at 4 A. M. for their last rush south¬ 
wards, ere they began to retrace their steps, and 
taking with them only food, instruments, and 
the flag given to them by Queen Alexandra, 
they traveled, half-running, half-walking, for 
five hours, reaching latitude 88° 23' at nine 
o’clock. There they hoisted the flag, and took 
possession of the plateau in the name of King 
Edward. 

Ahead of them, only ninety-seven geograph- ' 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


251 


ical miles away, lay the South Pole, the goal of 
all their strivings; but across that frozen stretch 
of snow and ice it was impossible to go. Looking 
through their powerful glasses, they scanned 
the horizon to the south; but only the great, 
white snow-plain could be seen. “There was no 
break in the plateau,” says Shackleton, “as it ex¬ 
tended towards the Pole, and we feel sure that 
the goal we have failed to reach lies on this 
plain/’ 

There, on this immense plateau, more than 
10,000 feet above sea-level, the Pole kept its 
secret; while the men who had struggled to reach 
it turned their faces to the north and stepped 
out for home. 

As the four men had hurried towards the 
Pole with feverish eagerness, so did they make 
their way back with equal haste. There was no 
time to lose, if they were not to starve and die 
by the way. Every minute was precious. They 
hastened over the slippery ice-slopes, and crossed 
pressure-ridges and crevasses at full speed. 

Weakened by the privations they had en¬ 
dured, and now reduced to four biscuits a day 
each, the weary travelers could scarcely keep 
moving. They ate the last of their solid food 
on the 26th, and the next day they were almost 
too exhausted to continue. But they were com¬ 
ing near to the depot, and the prospect of hav- 


252 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


ing something to eat spurred their lagging limbs 
to renewed effort. Hurrying on to the depot, 
Marshall returned with some pony-meat and 
biscuits, which provided the party with the first 
food they had tasted for thirty-two hours. 

Leaving the plateau behind, and treading the 
surface of the Barrier once more, they encoun¬ 
tered another blizzard, which obscured nearly 
everything from view; they could see only a few 
yards in front; but they dared not stand still, 
and they pushed on through the blinding snow¬ 
storm. 

It now required a great effort to cover one 
mile and a half in the hour; and, to make matters 
worse, all the party were attacked with dysentery. 
Reaching the depot, in 82° 45' south, they picked 
up some scanty provisions and the sledge which 
had been left at that stage, and on February 
3 started off afresh. A day later they were 
again all laid low with dysentery, so that no 
march was possible. They managed to resume 
their journey on the following day, but it was 
only with the greatest difficulty that they did so. 

Reduced to half a pannikin of warmed meat 
and five biscuits a day for each man, they kept 
moving, and made a little better progress than 
before. On the 13th, all their food finished, they 
reached the depot where the second pony had 
been killed. 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


253 


Taking the pony-meat and biscuits that were 
there, to serve them till they reached Depot A, 
ninety miles farther north, they once more re¬ 
sumed their march. They now covered the 
ground at a smarter rate, and frequently trav¬ 
eled more than twenty miles in the course of the 
day. So, day by day, the distance between them 
and headquarters gradually lessened. They 
were doing bravely in their struggle, and their 
strength was being fairly well maintained on 
the flesh of their dead pony. 

On the 22nd they came upon the tracks of a 
party of four men with dogs. This encouraged 
them in the hope that food had been safely de¬ 
posited for them at a point called the Bluff. At 
this depot they found plenty of food, and there 
also they learned of the Nimrod's return. 

With better heart they resumed their march; 
but one more trouble was in store for them. 
Suffering from another attack of dysentery, 
Marshall became too ill to proceed, and leaving 
him under the care of Adams, Shackleton and 
Wild made a forced march of thirty-three miles 
to the ship, which they reached on the 1st of 
March. 

Shackleton, who had been without sleep for 
twenty-four hours, might well have handed over 
to his officers the task of rescuing the two men 
who had been left behind, waiting, in their weak- 


2 54 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


ness and loneliness, for help; but he preferred 
to do the work himself. Taking time only to 
eat a hasty meal, he immediately started back 
to the relief of Marshall and Adams. He 
reached them after traveling for a day and a 
half, and brought them back in safety to the ship. 
With little sleep, he had traveled ninety-nine 
miles in three days, at the end of a journey of 
1700 miles—an achievement worthy of being 
ranked among the greatest feats of Polar enter¬ 
prise. 

During the absence of Shackleton and his 
comrades on the march towards the Pole, the 
other members of the expedition also had been 
busy. The northern party, under Professor 
David, left the winter quarters, with the object 
of discovering the Magnetic Pole. In their long 
and perilous journey they experienced similar 
difficulties to those that fell to the lot of Shack¬ 
leton and his men. They, too, had to climb a 
plateau which was intersected with numerous 
crevasses; and they frequently disappeared in 
them, but fortunately without serious conse¬ 
quences. 

Climbing a succession of frozen terraces, they 
found themselves between 7000 and 8000 feet 
above sea-level, and on January 16, 1909, tri¬ 
umphantly reached the goal of their labors in 
latitude 72° 45' south, longitude 155° 16' east. 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


255 


There, at the Magnetic Pole, they proudly 
hoisted the Union Jack. On their way back 
they were picked up by the Nimrod, after many 
perils and adventures, and in a pitiable plight 
through hunger and weakness. 

Excellent work was accomplished also by the 
party which explored the western mountains 
with the object of learning something of their 
geology. This little band also had its adven¬ 
tures. One night, the three men constituting 
the party camped on an ice-floe. The follow¬ 
ing morning they were horrified to discover that 
the floe was adrift, and apparently bearing them 
to certain death. Throughout the day the ice 
continued its drift towards the sea, the men cheer¬ 
ing each other as well as they could under the 
gloomy circumstances. 

Fortunately a change in the current during 
the night brought the floe into temporary touch 
with the land ice. Seizing the opportunity, the 
explorers quickly escaped from the moving ice 
to a more secure position, leaving the floe to 
continue its course to the north. Next day the 
ship was sighted about eleven miles away; and 
the men were soon safely on board and enjoy¬ 
ing her comfortable shelter. 

Without the loss of a single man, and with 
every member of the expedition in the best of 
health, the Nimrod shortly afterwards sailed 


256 


FARTHEST SOUTH 


north. All on board were highly satisfied with 
the results of the expedition; but they were glad, 
nevertheless, to be once more on the way back 
to civilization and friends. 


THE GREAT RACE TO THE GOAL 


T HE success of Shackleton’s wonderful 
march over the frozen wastes had shown 
what could be accomplished by the adop¬ 
tion of wise methods; and other explorers now 
prepared to hasten southwards, each fired with 
the ambition to reach the goal ahead of his rivals. 

Hoping to win the honor of being first at the 
South Pole, Dr. J. B. Charcot’s French expedi¬ 
tion, which set out in 1908, was in the Polar 
waters while the world was listening to the 
high achievements of Sir Ernest Shackleton. 
Although Charcot did not succeed in his attempt 
to reach the Pole, he claimed that the entire 
scientific program of his expedition was carried 
out. Collisions with icebergs, terrific tempests, 
and shortness of food and coal were among the 
hardships experienced; but they were borne with 
cheerfulness. 

In the ship, the Pourquoi Pas * the expedi¬ 
tion, during the first summer, was able to com¬ 
plete the French map as far as Adelaide Island, 
seventy miles in breadth, lying to the south of a 
vast gulf. A stretch of new land, 120 miles 


* Pourquoi pas? = Why not? 



258 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


long, was surveyed, and the expedition ulti¬ 
mately reached Alexander I. Land. Winter¬ 
ing at Petermann Island, they experienced 
severe weather, and several members of the ex¬ 
pedition were attacked with sickness. 

When the Antarctic summer came round, the 
expedition carried out exploration work in the 
South Shetlands and subsequently went south 
again, discovering new land to the wxst and 
south of Alexander I. Land. Sir Ernest Shack - 
leton regards these discoveries as particularly 
important, as they help to link up that part of 
the continent with King Edward VII. Land. 

Describing one of his experiences during this 
expedition, Charcot says they were lying in a 
bay which they had discovered, and which he had 
named Marguerite Bay, after his wife. “Every¬ 
thing seemed quiet, and we were preparing for 
an expedition on the ice. There was a small 
iceberg about five hundred yards from the Pour - 
quoi Pas . Two of us had been out in a boat to 
take soundings and make observations on the 
berg itself only a few hours before. 

“I was writing in my cabin—it was about 
half-past eleven at night—when suddenly a tre¬ 
mendous roar was heard. I sprang on deck, to 
find that the iceberg was capsizing. It was com¬ 
ing straight towards us, rolling on its axis, big 
slices breaking off as it advanced. By the rarest 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


259 


of good fortune we had steam up. I signalled 
to the engineer, who fortunately understood my 
gesture, to go full speed astern; and at the same 
time I ordered the crew to slip the cables. 

“On came the berg, passing clean over the 
spot where we had been moored to the ice a few 
seconds before. So narrow was our escape that 
it smashed one of our boats, and a lump of the 
iceberg broke off and wedged itself under the 
bowsprit. If we had been in bed, with only the 
ordinary lookout on deck, that would have been 
the last ever heard of us and the Pourquoi Pas!” 

Charcot having failed to reach the Pole, the 
way was still open, and the honor of being first 
there became a matter of international competi¬ 
tion. The representatives of the Union Jack 
were determined that, having carried their flag 
to within less than a hundred miles of the goal, 
they would not rest content till they saw it 
fluttering at the Pole itself. But there were 
rivals in the field. America, ambitious for a 
double victory, and Germany, were also busily 
making preparations for running in the race 
Polewards. 

In command of the British expedition was 
Captain R. F. Scott, whose work in connection 
with the famous Discovery expedition has al¬ 
ready been described. His new ship, Terra 
Nova, took her departure on June 1, 1910. 


260 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


Well fitted for ice-navigation, this vessel was the 
largest and strongest of the old Scottish 
whalers, and in 1903 was purchased by the Ad¬ 
miralty as relief-ship for the Discovery expedi¬ 
tion. 

The main object of the expedition was to 
reach the South Pole, and secure the honor of 
that achievement for the British Empire. The 
plan for the journey to the Pole from King 
Edward VII. Land included the use of three 
methods of sledge-traveling. For the first time 
in the history of Antarctic exploration motor- 
sledges were to be used. Ponies were taken 
in sufficient numbers to ensure a thoroughly 
adequate amount of food being conveyed to the 
base of the glacier. A dog-team, with a relay 
of men, was to transport the loads over the 
glacier surface; and a picked party of men and 
dogs were to make the final dash across the in¬ 
land ice-sheet. 

The principal scientific objects of the expedi¬ 
tion were to explore King Edward VII. Land; 
to throw further light on the nature and extent 
of the Great Barrier ice-formation; to continue 
the survey of the high, mountainous region of 
Victoria Land; and to add to the magnetic rec¬ 
ords made by the Discovery Expedition. This 
comprehensive program necessitated the estab¬ 
lishment of a strong party of men at the winter- ' 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


261 


station, and a more ample equipment than had 
hitherto been taken. 

Captain Scott had thought out the idea of the 
motor-sledge after his last expedition; and 
though he did not rely upon it altogether, he had 
great hope of its utility. “The sledge,” he ex¬ 
plained, “lays its own track. A twelve to fif¬ 
teen-horse-power engine drives the two rear 
wheels. Connecting these with the front wheels 
are two endless bands, having flat pieces of 
wood on the outside and rollers on the inside. 
The sledge-wheels run on the inside rollers. 
Carrying a load of nearly two tons, partly food, 
partly fuel, a sledge can travel three miles an 
hour. In that time the engine consumes one 
gallon of petrol. 

“It may not prove possible,” continued Cap¬ 
tain Scott, “to take the motor-sledges over the 
glaciers. If not, we must drop them. At stages 
on the dash across the mountain regions we 
shall leave behind four of the men, then another 
four, then a third four. At each selection the 
fittest will go on. The four who prove finally 
the fittest will make for the Pole. Our pros¬ 
pects of success will be greatly improved if, as 
I strongly hope, the dogs are able to climb the 
glaciers. If not, the men themselves will be com¬ 
pelled to haul the dog-sledges.” 

Captain Scott regarded the proposed Amer- 


262 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


ican expedition only in the friendliest light. 
Both expeditions would be starting for the Pole 
about the same time. “From the American base, 
on the Weddell Sea,” Captain Scott said, “there 
is thought to be a gradual slope upwards to the 
Pole. The Americans will have two mountains 
and glaciers to cross, most probably; but up to 
the present time no suitable spot for wintering 
is known to exist in that part of the Antarctic 
continent.’’ 

Meanwhile, still another nation was in the 
race for the South Pole. This was Norway, rep¬ 
resented by Captain Roald Amundsen and his 
stout ship, the Fram. 

But a little while before, nothing was farther 
from Amundsen’s thoughts than a voyage into 
the Southern regions. He was, in fact, making 
preparations to lead the Frames third expedi¬ 
tion towards the North Pole, when the news of 
Peary’s success was flashed across the world. 
He then resolved to alter his course and make a 
bold attempt to solve the problem of the South. 

Leaving Norway about the middle of August, 
1910, the Fram reached Ross Sea towards the 
end of the same year; and the Bay of Whales 
in the great Antarctic Barrier, chosen as the 
base of operations, was reached in the middle of 
January. A well-sheltered site was selected as 
winter quarters; and, as weather permitted, 



© Underwood and Underwood 

THE FRAM AND MEMBERS OF THE AMUNDSEN EXPEDITION ON SKIIS 









GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


263 


parties were despatched to establish food-sup- 
plies along the route to the south. The winter 
months passed uneventfully, the leader care¬ 
fully maturing his plans, and waiting patiently 
for the day when he would embark in earnest 
upon the great enterprise of his life. 

The Antarctic spring broke about the middle 
of October, and on the 20th a start was made 
for the Pole, the party consisting of five men, 
fifty-two dogs, and four sledges. Everything 
went well from the start, although blizzards 
were encountered during the early days of the 
march and the usual dangers were met with 
from snow-covered crevasses. But, on the 
whole, it was more like a pleasure-trip than a 
hazardous venture into wind-swept and ice¬ 
bound regions. The little party pushed steadily 
southwards for nearly two months, and at last, 
on December 14, stood at the very Pole itself. 

Describing this day of days, Captain Amund¬ 
sen says: “I have a feeling that we slept less, 
breakfasted at a greater speed, and started 
earlier this morning (the 14th) than on the 
previous days. The day was fine as usual—bril¬ 
liant sunshine with a gentle breeze. We made 
good headway. We didn’t talk much. Every¬ 
body was occupied with his own thoughts; or 
probably all of us had the same thought, which 
caused us to look towards the south over the 


264 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


endless plateau. Were we the first, or Halt! 
The distance was covered, the goal reached. The 
mighty plateau stretched before us, untrodden 
by the foot of man. No sign or mark in any 
direction! It was a solemn moment for all of 
us when, with our hands on the flagstaff, we 
planted the colors of our country at the South 
Pole, on King Haakon VII. Plateau.” 

For several days Amundsen and his comrades 
remained in the neighborhood of the Pole. On 
the 15th three members of the party made a 
circle round the camp, with a radius of ten miles; 
while others took hourly observations, which 
gave the latitude as 89° 55' S. 

The next day the camp was moved five miles 
farther south, and there a little tent brought for 
the purpose was erected at the very Pole, the 
Norwegian flag with the Fram pendant was 
hoisted, and the place was named Polheim. A 
letter addressed to Plaakon VII., to be brought 
back by the next explorer to reach the Pole, 
was left in the tent, together with some cloth¬ 
ing and a few scientific instruments. 

One thing Amundsen did not leave, though 
he thought of doing so. That was a quantity of 
oil—two five-gallon cans—which he thought 
would not be required on the return journey. 
In the light of later events Amundsen bitterly 
regretted this decision, for it might have pro- 



© Underwood and Underwood 


LIEUT. HANSEN 1 OF THE AMUNDSEN EXPEDITION STANDING 

AT THE SOUTH POLE 





GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


265 


vided the British party under Scott that fol¬ 
lowed him a month later with the fuel they so 
sorely needed, and might possibly have pre¬ 
vented the disaster which ended that courageous 
enterprise. 

Extending over 750 miles, the outward jour¬ 
ney of Amundsen’s party had been accomplished 
at an average of thirteen miles a day; but good 
as this record was, it was exceeded on the home¬ 
ward run, when, again favored by splendid con¬ 
ditions, the average daily speed was nineteen 
miles. The snow beacons erected by the party 
when traveling south enabled them to find their 
way back with comparative ease; and with the 
joy of achievement as a stimulant to their ener¬ 
gies, they sped rapidly over the snow and ice, 
unhampered by ill-health or shortage of food. 

While Amundsen and his men were stepping 
lightly along, the British explorers were fight¬ 
ing hardship every inch of their way. Ihe Nor¬ 
wegians had struck an easy route and fav orablc 
weather; the British party, starting fiom 
McMurdo Sound, where the headquarters had 
been established, and where earlier expeditions 
had wintered, found both the track and the 
weather extremely trying. Both parties reached 
the Pole; but while the good fortune of the Nor¬ 
wegians clung to them all the way back, Cap¬ 
tain Scott’s party experienced terrible hardships, 


266 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


and at last succumbed when 155 miles from the 
base, too weak to reach the stores, only eleven 
miles away, that would have saved their lives. 

Exploring the Antarctic coast line in Febru¬ 
ary, 1911, the British sighted the Fram, when 
Scott learned with considerable surprise that 
Captain Amundsen, instead of being in the 
Northern waters, according to his declared in¬ 
tention, was making preparations for a dash to 
the South Pole. But this had no effect upon the 
program of the British party. Scott resisted the 
temptation to take part in a race for the Pole 
by making a premature start; being acquainted 
with the risks of the journey, he was determined 
to leave nothing to chance. 

The winter was spent by the explorers in pre¬ 
paring for the run southwards when the coming 
of spring should permit of traveling over the 
icy wastes. Then with four companions—Dr. 
E. A. Wilson, zoologist and artist; Lieutenant 
H. R. Bowers, of the Royal Indian Marine, in 
charge of the commissariat; Captain L. E. G. 
Oates, of the Inniskilling Dragoons, in charge 
of the ponies; and Petty-Qfficer Evans, of the 
Royal Navy, in charge of the sledges and equip¬ 
ment—Captain Scott had entered on the last 
stage of the journey. 

Captain Scott’s own story of the expedition 
up to that point showed that many difficulties' 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


267 


and perils had been met with, that ponies and 
motor-sledges had broken down under the severe 
strain, and that blinding blizzards had added to 
the dangers and the hardships of the journey. 

At one part of the way, when cutting off a 
corner at White Island in bad light, the whole 
of the dog team fell into a crevasse, and were 
extricated with great difficulty after three hours 
hard work. In spite of many drawbacks, how¬ 
ever, steady progress was made; and on Janu¬ 
ary 3, 1912, writing in latitude 87° 32' S., 
from a height of about 9800 feet, Captain Scott 
stated that after leaving the upper glacier south 
of Mount Darwin, he had steered south-west 

for two days. 

“This did not,” he continued, “keep us clear 
of the pressure ridges and crevasses, which oc¬ 
curred frequently, and at first gave us some 
trouble, but we rose rapidly in altitude. On 
Christmas Day we were close up to the 86th 
parallel; and the prospect of Christmas fare 
gave us an excellent march of seventeen miles. 

After the last of the supporting parties had 
turned back, the five men maintained an aver¬ 
age of twelve miles a day right up to the Pole, 
which they reached on January 17, 1912. Here 
they found Amundsen’s tent and records left 
only a month earlier. The whole story was then 
clear to them. They had been beaten in their 


268 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


race to the Pole. After all their struggle it 
was a barren honor. 

“It is a terrible disappointment,” is Scott’s 
only comment; “and I am very sorry for my 
loyal companions.” 

At the Pole the temperature was 20° below 
zero. It was found that the surface, unlike that 
of the Barrier, was soft, and had no crust on it. 

They planted the British flag near the Nor¬ 
wegian, and after remaining two days resting, 
making observations, and leaving records, they 
started back. The return journey over the 
Polar plateau began well, marked by good 
marches and moderately good weather; but 
sterner conditions lay ahead. The surfaces be¬ 
came more difficult, and in the descent of the 
Beardmore Glacier the weather was excep¬ 
tionally thick, with snow falling and the sur¬ 
rounding land only occasionally to be seen. 

Bad, however, as the conditions around them 
had become, they were not the only perils en¬ 
countered. Evans, the “strong man of the party,” 
began to show signs of weakness at the Pole; and 
on the plateau he was a great anxiety to his com¬ 
panions. Then, in their descent of the Glacier, 
Evans fell among the rough ice, seriously injur¬ 
ing his head. With a weak and injured com¬ 
rade on their hands, the others were compelled 
to moderate their pace, and in consequence the 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


269 


surplus food was gradually diminished. The 
pace, however, slow as it had become, was too 
much for the enfeebled traveler. He became so 
weak that he had to be carried on the sledge; 
and on February 17 he died, at the foot of 
the Beardmore Glacier. 

The next to give way under the terrible strain 
was Captain Oates, who had been struggling 
bravely on, in spite of badly frost-bitten hands 
and feet. By March 16 it was obvious that 
he could not last much longer. “He was a brave 
soul,” wrote Captain Scott, in recording his 
death. “He slept through the night hoping not 
to wake, but he awoke in the morning. It was 
blowing a blizzard. Oates said, T am going out¬ 
side, and I mav be some time.’ He went out 
into the blizzard, and we have not seen him since. 
We knew that Oates was walking to his death, 
but though we tried to dissuade him, we knew 
it was the act of a brave man and an English 
gentleman.” 

The party, now reduced to three, once more 
pushed on as fast as the weather, which had be¬ 
come extremely bad, would permit them; but 
they were forced to camp five days later. Only 
eleven miles separated them from the One Ton 
Camp, where food and fuel awaited them, but 
which they were never to reach; and while the 
blizzard raged furiously around their tent they, 


270 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


one by one, passed into the sleep that knows no 
waking. 

Months later a search-party discovered the 
three bodies, and found the diary of their leader, 
in which the pitiful story was set forth. 

“The causes of this disaster are not due to 
faulty ‘organization,’ but to misfortune. 

“The loss of pony transport in March, 1911, 
obliged me to start later than I had intended, 
and obliged the limits of stuff transported to be 
narrowed. 

“The weather throughout the outward jour¬ 
ney, and especially the long gale in 83° S., 
stopped us. 

“The soft snow in the lower reaches of the 
glacier again reduced the pace. We fought 
these untoward events with a will, and con¬ 
quered, but it ate into our provisions-reserve. 
Every detail of our food-supplies, clothing, and 
depots made on the interior ice-sheet, and on 
that long stretch of 700 miles to the Pole and 
back, worked out to perfection. 

“The advance-party would have returned to 
the glacier in fine form, and with a surplus of 
food, but for the astonishing failure of the man 
whom we had least expected to fail. Seaman 
Edgar Evans was thought the strong man of 
the party, and the Beardmore Glacier is not 
difficult in fine weather. 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


271 


“But on our return we did not get a single 
completely fine day. This, with a sick compan¬ 
ion, enormously increased our anxieties. 

“I have said elsewhere we got into frightfully 
rough ice, and Edgar Evans received a concus¬ 
sion of the brain. He died a natural death, but 
left us a shaken party, with the season unduly 
advanced. 

“But all the facts above enumerated were as 
nothing to the surprise which awaited us on the 
Barrier. I maintain that our arrangements for 
returning were quite adequate, and that no one 
in the world would have expected the tempera¬ 
ture and surface which we encountered at this 
time of the year. On the summit in lat. 85° to 
lat. 86° we had minus 20° to minus 30°. On the 
Barrier in lat. 82°, 10,000 feet lower, we had 
minus 30° in the day and minus 47° at night 
pretty regularly, with a continuous head-wind 
during our day-marches. 

“I do not think human beings ever came 
through such a month as we have come through; 
and we should have got through, in spite of the 
weather, but for the sickening of a second com¬ 
panion, Captain Oates, and a shortage of fuel 
in our depots for which I cannot account; and, 
finally, but for the storm which has fallen on us 
within eleven miles of the depot at which we 
hoped to secure the final supplies. 


272 


GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


“Surely misfortune could scarcely have ex¬ 
ceeded this last blow. We arrived within eleven 
miles of our old One Ton Camp with fuel for 
one hot meal and food for two days. 

“For four days we have been unable to leave 
the tent, a gale blowing about us. 

“We are weak, writing is difficult, but for my 
own sake I do not regret this journey, which 
has shown us that Englishmen can endure hard¬ 
ship, help one another, and meet death with as 
great a fortitude as ever in the past. 

“We took risks—we know we took them. 

“Things have come out against us, and there¬ 
fore we have no cause for complaint, but bow 
to the will of Providence, determined still to do 
our best to the last. 

“Had we lived I should have had a tale to tell 
of the hardihood, endurance, and courage of my 
companions which would have stirred the heart 
of every Englishman.” 

To Scott’s pathetic narrative there is little to 
add. The bodies were discovered a few months 
later by the party that had gone in search of their 
comrades. Captain Scott, apparently the last 
to die, was found sitting with his back to the 
tent-pole, with his diary resting between him 
and the pole; while Wilson and Bowers were 
lying in their sleeping-bags. 

It looked as if the commander had taken fare- 



GREAT RACE TO GOAL 


273 


well of his fellow-sufferers as they lay in the 
bags that were to prove their shroud; and then, 
having seen them close their eyes in death, he 
himself sat down to wait for the end. Hope 
had fled, but the spirit of the man was uncon¬ 
quered. Not a word of complaint did he write 
as his frozen fingers slowly penned his farewell 
to the world. He “bowed to the will of Prov¬ 
idence.” 


XXII 




RECENT VOYAGES 

T HE untimely death of Scott, like that of 
Franklin in an earlier period of Polar ex¬ 
ploration, stirred up a profound popular 
interest in the subject. All the world united 
with England in tributes to the memory of the 
heroic voyagers. Although both the North and 
the South Poles had been discovered, it was felt 
that no stone must be left unturned to map out 
the unknown lands lying near the Poles. 

This was the task which Sir Ernest Shack- 
leton now set himself, in a ship appropriately 
called the Quest. Shackleton, we remember, 
served his apprenticeship with Scott and on a 
later independent voyage achieved the “Farthest 
South” until the Pole itself was discovered. 

Shackleton’s new expedition reached the 
southern seas in the latter part of 1921, on what 
was to have been a prolonged voyage of explo¬ 
ration and discovery, partly of Enderby Land. 
This land had been first reported by Captain 
Enderby nearly a century earlier, but no one 
after himself had ever located it. But Shackle- 
ton himself did not live to carry out the adven¬ 
ture. He died suddenly on board his ship, off 

( 274 ) 







RECENT VOYAGES 


27 5 


the coast of South Georgia Island, from natural 
causes. 

The most completely equipped of all Ant¬ 
arctic expeditions was that of Captain J. Loch- 
lan Cope, who was a member of the last Shack- 
leton expedition as surgeon and biologist to the 
Ross Sea party. The official name chosen was 
British Imperial Antarctic Expedition. The 
ship chosen was the Terra Nova, Captain Scott’s 
old vessel, upon which very extensive alterations 
had been made, including the installation of oil¬ 
burning engines and the building of an addi¬ 
tional deck. A novel feature was the proposed 
use of an airplane with which to cross the Ant¬ 
arctic continent and to carry on surveying and 
photographic work. A machine capable of car¬ 
rying three men, photographic apparatus, wire¬ 
less apparatus, a sledge, the necessary gasoline, 
and provisions for a month were taken along. 
The intention was to leave a depot of gaso¬ 
line near Axel Heiberg Glacier before cross¬ 
ing the high interior mountains, and to make 
use of the fuel on the return trip from the Pole. 

The general plan was to proceed from Wel¬ 
lington to Macquarie Island, to make a survey 
of it, and to proceed to Scott Island, where three 
men were to he landed with a specially con¬ 
structed hut. They were to remain there one 
year and carry on meteorological work. From 


276 


RECENT VOYAGES 


> 


Scott Island the Terra Nova was to go to New 
Harbor in the Ross Sea, where a large hut was 
to be set up. Thence the vessel was to proceed 
to Cape Crozier on Ross Island, where three 
men were to be left a year to study the emperor 
penguins and do meteorological work, a small 
hut being provided for them. An attempt was 
to be made to fly by airplane to the Pole itself. 
This work was to be the preliminary of another 
expedition which would work for four or five 
years and attempt to circumnavigate the Ant¬ 
arctic Continent. 

Several other airplanes and an extensive wire¬ 
less system, by means of which it was hoped to 
keep in touch with civilization at all times, were 
to be held in reserve. 

Commander Cope before starting south said 
that while the Thor I. was circumnavigating the 
lower part of the continent her sister ship, sail¬ 
ing from Cape Ann, would go around the Bay 
of Whales and the upper part of the Conti¬ 
nent, completing the circle. The other airplanes, 
meanwhile, were to be utilized on shore. They 
have a cruising radius of 1,000 miles, but the 
first year were to be sent out only 250 miles 
for the establishment of new patrol bases and 
the following year sent out an additional 250 
miles. The Thor Z. was scheduled, according 
to Commander Cope’s plans, to return to New 


RECENT VOYAGES 


277 


Zealand in 1926 at about the same time that her 
sister ship returned to South America. 

“Previous Antarctic explorations have been 
adventures/’ said Commander Cope. “This one 
is a scientific and commercial proposition. The 
final object of our enterprise is a search for the 
mineral wealth with which we are sure the South 
Polar regions abound.” In addition to the 
minerals previously mentioned, he said that Ant¬ 
arctica was rich in gold, silver, copper and lead 
in the chain of mountains that rise like gigantic 
sentinels guarding the secret of its vast and icy 
polar fields. 

Meanwhile voyagers to the North have not 
been idle. Captain Roald Amundsen, who had 
already won fame in both Poles, once more 
turned his attention to Arctic discovery. He 
had been the first to navigate the Northwest 
Passage, but not content he set sail again, this 
time eastward from Norway, in June, 1918, in 
the Maud. 

Nothing was heard of the intrepid explorer 
for nearly two years, when he arrived at Ana¬ 
dir, a Siberian trading post. In July, 1920, he 
reached Nome, Alaska. 

His plan then was to proceed to the north and 
drift across or near the North Pole in the ice. 
The new start was made August 7, but word was 
received at Nome, September 26, that the Maud 


278 


RECENT VOYAGES 


had not proceeded far before it was locked in the 
ice between Wrangell Island and the northern 
Siberian coast. Captain Amundsen then had a 
crew of only three men with him. 

Following is an account of the trip of the 
Maud in the waters of the Arctic between the 
ice pack and the northern edges of Europe and 
America, which in connection with the voyage 
through the Northwest Passage from the Atlan¬ 
tic to the Pacific, in 1906, gave Captain Amund¬ 
sen the honor of being the first to circumnavigate 
the globe north of Europe, Asia and America: 

“We left our winter place on September 12, 
1919, after having mined and forced our way 
through 2,500 yards of unbroken ice from two to 
three yards thick. We were detained next day 
by heavy pack at St. Samuel’s Island, but got 
through on the 14th and continued our way to 
the east, being again detained next day, as the 
ice lay close to St. Peter’s Island and did not 
assist any passage outside. 

“We had to force our way through the un¬ 
known strait between the islands and the main¬ 
land, where newly-formed ice offered consider¬ 
able resistance. We succeeded after a vigorous 
battle in penetrating this intricate and shallow 
passage, showing in some places no more than 
one and a half feet of water under the keel. 

“Much ice was found in the Nordenskiold 


RECENT VOYAGES 


279 


Sea, but it offered small hindrance to our ad¬ 
vance. We passed through the Strait of Laptec, 
separating the inner Siberian islands from the 
mainland, on the 19th. The sea to the east of 
the islands seemed free from ice and we shaped 
our course from Jeannette Island, but were 
stopped next morning by impenetrable pack 
on the 73rd parallel. 

“We made fast to the edge to begin our drift, 
but found shortly after, by close examination, 
that the ice pack was in drift toward the south 
at the rate of one and a half knots an hour. 
This would not do, so we cast loose from the ice, 
after a very careful inspection, which left us no 
hope whatsoever of penetrating it, and shaped 
our course to the southeast, following the ice. 

“It was a bitter pill to swallow, but we de¬ 
cided to search for winter quarters somewhere 
along the coast. The only fit place. was 
Tschaun Bay. Navigation southward here in the 
latter part of September was most extraordi¬ 
nary : the nights were pitch dark, the sea running 
heavy, and enormous ice floes very often in the 
middle of our course—it was not pleasant. 
From time to time a brilliant aurora borealis 
would appear and light us out of many an in¬ 
tricate situation. 

“A northwest gale had been blowing all this 
time, and the result was that the pack ice 



280 


RECENT VOYAGES 


reached our intended winter quarters just a 
little ahead of us and shut us out. We had no 
choice, as the ice came closer and closer to the 
coast. We went, therefore, as far as the ice per¬ 
mitted, and, plunging into some old floes fring¬ 
ing the west coast of Aion Island, remained 

there. • 

“Three days after our arrival there we met 
with some members of the Tschuktschi and 
Maquati tribes. They had their tents on Aion 
Islan,d but left for the interior of the country 
on October 13, to spend the winter in the woods 
watching their reindeer herds.” 

Two members of the expedition named Knud- 
sen and Tessen left the ship with mail for 
home, but nothing further was heard from them 
and it was assumed that they were lost. 

The Maud was often so heavily weighed down 
by ice that the propeller and the helm were 
frozen and only the masts were visible above the 
surface. Bears were heard padding across the 
snow masses covering the ship’s deck. By the 
time she reached Cape Cheliuskin the Maud en¬ 
countered extremely hard, heavy ice, but, thanks 
to her splendid construction, she withstood all 
the attacks of the elements. 

New land was discovered near Tsar Nicholas 
II. Land, and it was scientifically explored. A 
thorough study of the customs and manners of 


RECENT VOYAGES 


281 


the surrounding Eskimo tribes was also made. 
Several adventures occurred. Amundsen him¬ 
self fell from the ship down on to the ice and 
broke one of his arms, and he also had a narrow 
escape in an encounter with a bear. 

Amundsen refitted the Maud after this cruise 
and, on June 3, 1922, set sail again north¬ 
ward on a still more ambitious quest. He 
planned a five-year voyage among the ice packs 
surrounding the Pole, a study of magnetic cur¬ 
rents, and—most ambitious of all—an airplane 
flight directly across the Pole. He said, on leav¬ 
ing, that he hoped to map out an Arctic route 
for airplanes which would be commercially fea¬ 
sible as providing much shorter “hops” to ad¬ 
jacent countries, than if one followed the tem¬ 
perate zone. 

Greenland has been the object of special study 
on the part of Denmark. In 1919, the Danish 
explorer, Knud Rasmussen, returned from a 
voyage to the east coast, where he made a pro¬ 
longed study of the Eskimos. He was followed 
by Lange Koch, another Dane, who set out on 
a two years’ cruise, the objective point being 
North Point, in order to proclaim Danish sov¬ 
ereignty over the whole of Greenland. 

Baffin Land, a very rich and alluring field for 
explorers and scientists, was the object of an ex¬ 
pedition which was sent out in the summer of 


282 


RECENT VOYAGES 


1921, under Donald B. MacMillan, one of 
Peary’s lieutenants on the expedition that 
reached the North Pole. During the following 
winter the object was to explore the coast of 
Baffin Land, and the next summer the party 
planned to penetrate the interior. Very little 
is now known about the territory whose whole 
western shore, of perhaps 1,000 miles in length, 
is but vaguely defined on charts. 

MacMillan’s ship was a tiny schooner of only 
115 tons, eighty-seven feet long, and drawing 
ten feet of water. But she was equipped to the 
last inch, and every inch was utilized. Auxiliary 
power, through the use of crude oil, and a wire¬ 
less equipment were among the new features 
devised by the Captain and his associates. 

- “I hope to make new Arctic history with this 
little boat,” explained MacMillan. “My theory 
is that too many of the craft which have pene¬ 
trated those regions have been unwieldy, thus 
lending themselves too readily to the clutches 
of the winter ice. The Bowdoiris round, egg- 
shaped hull, I believe, will ride atop of the ice 
when it begins to form early in the fall, and be¬ 
cause of her compactness and diminutive size, 
she will weather it, we hope. Of course, one 
can never tell till afterward. If the boat is de¬ 
molished, we have our plans, of course, to gain 
the settlements over the ice.” 


RECENT VOYAGES 


283 


Another large island which has recently at¬ 
tracted attention is Wrangell Island, which is 
about the size of Jamaica, lies 100 miles off the 
northeastern coast of Siberia and 400 miles west 
of Bering Strait, in latitude 71 degrees, north, 
and longitude 180 degrees. For the most part 
it is a typical grass-covered Arctic prairie, noted 
for its interior granite cliffs, which reach a height 
of 2,000 feet, and also famed as the paradise of 
the polar bear. 

The British flag was hoisted anew over this 
island in March, 1922, by Vilhjalmur Stefans- 
son, although an American expedition laid claim 
to it as early as 1881. The island was, in fact, 
discovered in 1849. The final attempt to claim 
ownership, therefore, aroused a three-cornered 
controversy between America, Canada, and 
England. 

Stefansson had previously made a series of 
voyages with the object of testing the resources 
and living conditions of Arctic Canada. His 
findings were so sensational and unusual as to 
attract world-wide attention. He boldly upset 
existing notions that the Arctic regions are de¬ 
void of life. Hs book, “The Freindly Arctic,” 
is an extraordinary narrative of five years’ ex¬ 
ploration and scientific research by the Canadian 
Arctic Expedition, which was authorized, fi¬ 
nanced and directed by the Canadian Govern- 


284 


RECENT VOYAGES 


ment. ‘‘The book presents a totally new aspect 
of the Arctic region. Stefansson shows that, 
because of the climatic conditions and pasture 
resources, Arctic Canada must inevitably be 
added to the worlds area of food production. 
His experiences have brought out important 
revelations regarding the possibilities of human 
diet while exploring the frozen North, and actu¬ 
ally places future Arctic exploration on a new 
basis.” 

Such was the declaration of the National Geo¬ 
graphic Society, which awarded him a special 
prize. 

The Karluk, Stefansson’s ship, left Victoria, 
B. C., in June, 1913, and Nome, Alaska, the fol¬ 
lowing month. His first object was to push 
boldly into the North and prove for himself that 
the Arctic, instead of being barren and inhos¬ 
pitable, was in fact “friendly,” and could be 
made to support human life. 

“I was told by the Eskimos,” he says, “and I 
had read the same before in geographies and 
works of exploration, that the vast unknown 
areas beyond the Eskimo frontier were devoid 
of animal life. The Eskimos agreed with the 
rest of us in thinking that no one could live in 
those regions except for brief periods, and then 
only by taking along enough supplies to last 
for the whole period, or what must necessarily 


RECENT VOYAGES 


285 


be a dash into and a hurried retreat out of a 

region of permanent desolation. 

“I could see no natural reason why the regions 
beyond the Eskimo frontier should be devoid of 
animal life. The fact that the Eskimos said so, 
and the fact that geographies and encyclopae¬ 
dias continue to make the same assertion, meant 

little to me.I concluded the presumption 

to be that animal life could be found even in the 

very centre of the icy area. 

“My conclusion was that animal life had not 
been seen because it existed under the ice, where 
it would be inconspicuous. Hunting seals under 
thick polar ice resembles hunting as we com¬ 
monly think of it less than it does prospecting. 
.... I already knew the methods of securing 
seals, and came south in 1912 firm in the belief 
that I could go into regions where Eskimos had 
never been, and into which Eskimos were un¬ 
willing to go, because they believed them devoid 
of resources, and that I could, in these regions, 
travel indefinitely, carrying on scientific or other 
work, and depending entirely on the resources 
of the country for food and fuel—food being 
the flesh of animals and the fuel their fat.’’ 

Such was Stefansson’s theory, but in carry¬ 
ing it out he met with constant opposition, not 
only from other authorities but also from mem¬ 
bers of his own party. The failure of the latter 




286 


RECENT VOYAGES 


to carry out his instructions on one or two occa¬ 
sions nearly caused fatal results. But on the 
whole the expedition was remarkably successful 
in demonstrating that a resourceful man could 
live almost anywhere in the Arctic circle. 

In the spring of 1914, the explorer with two 
companions decided to follow with sledges the 
moving ice across Beaufort Sea from Martin 
Point, Alaska, to Banks Island. The adven¬ 
ture was a succession of thrills, but the party 
got across safely after traveling for three 
months. Meanwhile they found all the seals 
they needed, for both food and fuel. 

The three men spent the summer of 1914 on 
Banks Island, the description of which destroys 
another of the old ideas of the barrenness of the 
Arctic regions: 

‘‘Here was a beautiful country of valleys, 
green with grass, or mingled green and brown 
with grass and lichens, except some of the hill¬ 
tops, which were rocky and barren. . . . There 
were sparkling brooks that united into rivers of 
crystal clearness, flowing over gravel bottoms. 
.... Heather was most abundant, so were hull 
caribou, so that the meat we lived on and the fuel 
for cooking it were of the best.” 

Stefansson and his companions were the first 
white men to penetrate the interior of this island, 
where they enjoyed “delightful, care-free jour- 


RECENT VOYAGES 


287 


neys,” hunting and studying the country, while 
waiting for their relief ship. This did not come, 
through a failure to carry out his instructions. 
Later another ship was sent. 

The next winter was spent in Banks Island 
where they lived in igloos very comfortably; 
and the following spring (1915) found him 
journeying across drifting ice again, this time 
to Prince Patrick’s Island. The succeeding 
winter was again spent on Banks Island, 
and extensive sledge journeys were made 
during the following summer, resulting in 
the discovery of two large and several small 
islands. On one trip a point beyond the 
80th degree of latitude was reached. Melville 
Island was chosen as headquarters for the third 
winter, that of 1916-17. Here coal was found 
and game was plentiful. Storkerson, his chief 
lieutenant, explored McClintock Channel and 
settled the question of its continuity in 1917, 
while Stefansson himself set forth with two 
white men and an Eskimo on a new journey to 
the north. But after going only 140 miles across 
the ice, the two whites became sick with scurvy 
and Stefansson had to turn back with two in¬ 
valids on his hands. On reaching land, after a 
very trying time, during which provisions ran 
short, a supply of fresh caribou meat soon helped 
the sick men to make a rapid recovery. 


288 RECENT VOYAGES 

In his haste to get back to Cape Kellett, Stef- 
ansson covered the last seventy or eighty miles 
on foot alone, walking almost continuously for 
twenty-eight hours. This was a wonderful feat 
of endurance and showed his good physical con¬ 
dition. 

Here Stefansson learned that again his orders 
had been disregarded. One of his relief ships 
had been dismantled and broken up, and two 
of his best men, Bernard and Thomsen, had 
perished trying to head a relief expedition to 
him. They had not believed it possible for him 
to survive for so many months without shipped- 
in supplies. 

Stefansson s story is full of surprises and in 
marked contrast to the usual forbidding pictures 
of the frozen North. Its chief value, aside from 
the interest of the narrative, lies in the fact that 
it “actually places future Arctic exploration on 
a new basis.” 

In the summer of 1921, Stefansson announced 
that he was planning a new expedition of two 
or three years’ duration. 

“The centre of the ice-bound regions of the 
North never has been reached by man,” he said. 
“The North Pole region is 450 miles from the 
edge of the icy area, while the centre is 800 miles 
from the edge. We are chiefly interested in get- 


RECENT VOYAGES 


289 


ting to the centre and finding out what is there. 
I have no theories. It may be land or ice.” 

Thus one hardy voyager after another steps 
forward to wrest the last of Earth’s secrets 
away from her. Nor will mankind be content 
until the last square mile of her surface has been 
accurately mapped. With the rapid perfection 
of the motor vehicle and the airplane, far more 
rapid strides may be anticipated. We may even 
vision some of the explorers now living as sitting 
down, like Alexander, and sighing because there 
are no more worlds to conquer. 

But so long as there remains an Unknown 
with its mystery and lure—just so long will men 
fare forth on uncharted seas— 

To seek, to strive, to find, 

And not to yield. 




CHRONOLOGY 

I. ARCTIC 


Destination 


Year 

Explorer 

Nationality 

Reached 

982... 


. Norwegian. 

.Greenland 

1497... 


. English.... 

.Labrador (?) 

1500... 

. ..Gaspar Corte-Real.... 

. Portuguese 

. Greenland 

1555... 


.English.... 

.Novaya Zemlya 

1576... 


. English.... 

.Baffin Land 

1585... 


. English.... 

.Davis Strait 

1596... 


.Dutch. 

.Spitzbergen 

1607... 

.. .Henry Hudson. 

. English.... 

.Hudson Bay 

1610... 


. English.... 

.Spitzbergen 

1616... 

...William Baffin. 

.English.... 

. Baffin Bay 

1644... 


.Russian.... 

,N. Siberia 

1771... 


.English.... 

. Coppermine River 

1789... 


.English.... 

Mackenzie River 

1819... 


. English.... 

Melville Island 

1820... 


. English.... 

N. Canada 

1822... 


.English.... 

.E. Greenland 

1827... 


.English.... 

.Sea North of 
Spitzbergen 

1829... 


. English.... 

.Magnetic Pole 

1845... 


.English.... 

.Northwest Passage 

1853... 


.American.. 

.Smith Sound 

1860... 


.American.. 

.Grinnell Land 

1864... 


.American.. 

.Cape Brevoort 

1873... 

.. .Weyprecht and Payer. 

.Austrian... 

.Franz Josef Land 

1878... 

... A. E. Nordenskiold... 

.Swedish ... 

. Northeast Passage 

1879... 

...George W. De Long.. 

.American.. 

. New Siberia Isles 

1881... 

...Adolphus Greely. 

.American.. 

.Polar Seas 

1888... 


.Norwegian. 

.Polar Basin 

1894... 


, American.. 

. N. E. Spitzbergen 

1897... 


Swedish ... 

.Unknown 

1899... 


Italian. 

.Arctic Archipelago 

1903... 

...Roald Amundsen. 

Norwegian. 

.Northwest Passage 

1909... 


American.. 

.North Pole 


mi) 















































































292 


CHRONOLOGY 


II. ANTARCTIC 





Destination 

Year 

1567.. . 

1768.. . 

Explorer 

Nationality 

... Peru. 

Reached 

. “Terra Incognita” 


... English.... 

. S. New Zealand 

1819... 

...William Smith. 

... English.... 

.S. Shetland Isles 

1820... 

.. .Bellinghausen. 

.. .Russian_ 

. Alexander L Isle 

1823..., 

,. .Weddell. 

.. .English.... 

.Weddell Sea 

1831... 

.. .John Biscoe. 

.. .English.... 

. Enderby Land 

1838... 

...John Balleny. 

.. .English.... 

. Balleny Isles 

1840... 

. ..D’ Urville. 

... French .... 

.Adelie Land 

1840... 


.. .American.. 

. Wilkes Land 

1841... 


... English_ 

.Victoria Land 

1873... 



. Antarctic Circle 

1892... 

.. .Fairweather. 


. Graham Land 

1895... 

.. .Kristensen . 


.Victoria Land 

1898... 

.. .Borchgrevink. 

.. .Norwegian. 

.Victoria Land 

1898... 


.. .Belgian_ 

. Antarctic Circle 

1901... 


... German ... 

.Kaiser William 
Land 

1902... 



.S. Shetlands 

1902... 

...W. S. Brace. 


. Coats’ Land 

1907... 



.100 M. from Pole 

1908... 



.Alexander I. Land 

1911... 



. South Pole 

1912... 



.South Pole 






























































INDEX 


Abruzzi, Duke of, Arctic expe¬ 
dition of, 173-175. 

Adelie Land, discovered and 
named by D’Urville, 206 

Airplane, proposed use of, in 
Cope’s Antarctic expedition, 
275-276. 

Albert Land, Grinnell Land 
called, 84 

Alexander I. Island, discovery 
of, 204 

Alfred, King, as chronicler of 
Arctic adventure, 1-2 

Amundsen, Roald, discovery 
of Northwest Passage by, 
177-180; expedition to Ant¬ 
arctic in 1910, 262-264; arri¬ 
val at South Pole, 264; Arc¬ 
tic voyage in the Maud 
(1918-22), 277-281 

Andr6e, S. A., balloon voyage 
of, in search for North 
Pole, 171-173 

Antarctic. See South Pole 

Armitage, member of Scott’s 
Discovery expedition, 231- 
232 

Astrup, Eivind, companion of 
Peary, 182 

Back, Lieutenant, officer in 
Franklin expedition, 44-52, 
58, 59-60 

Baffin, William, voyage of, 17- 
18, 28; accuracy of observa¬ 
tions of, confirmed by later 
explorers, 35 

Baffin Land, sighted by Fro¬ 
bisher, 10; MacMillan ex¬ 
pedition to, 281-282 

Baffin’s Bay, discovery of, 18, 
28 

Balleny, John, English dis¬ 
coverer, 205 

Balloon, use of, by Andr6e, 
171-173; first use of, in Ant¬ 
arctic regions, 219-220 


Banks Island, Stefansson’s de¬ 
scription of, 286 
Bartlett, Captain, in charge 
of Peary's ship Koosevelt f 
194, 195 

Beechey Island, Franklin’s 
winter quarters at, 67 
Belgium, Antarctic expedi¬ 
tion sent out by, 209-211 
Bellinghausen, Russian ex¬ 
plorer, 204 

Bennett Island, naming of, 116 
Bernard, Captain Peter, mem¬ 
ber of Stefansson expedi¬ 
tion, 288 

Best, George, chronicler of 
Frobisher’s voyages, 11-15 
Biscoe, John, Antarctic voy¬ 
ager, 205 

Borchgrevink, Carstens, com¬ 
mander of Southern Cross 
expedition, 209 

Boicdoin, MacMillan’s vessel, 
282 

Bowers, H. R., with Scott in 
last expedition, 266-272 
Bradley, promoter of Dr. 
Cook’s Polar expedition, 
199-200 

Brevoort, Cape, record depos¬ 
ited by Captain Hall at, 99 
Bruce, Dr. W. work of, in 
Antarctic, 213-217 
Buchan, David, Arctic voy¬ 
ager, 34; quoted on insect 
pests, 42 

Budington, Captain, com¬ 
mander in Hall expedition, 
100-102 

Cabot, John, voyages of, 3-4 
Cabot, Sebastian, son of John 
Cabot, 3 

Challenoer expedition (1873- 
76), 209 

Chancellor, Richard, early 
explorer, 5-7 


( 293 ) 


294 


INDEX 


Charcot, Dr. J. B., leader o£ 
French expedition to Ant¬ 
arctic, 257-259 

Chipp, Lieutenant, member of 
Jeannette expedition, 117- 
120 

Coal found in Arctic regions, 
287 

Cold in Arctic regions, effects 
of, 39-40 

Columbus, Christopher, 1, 3, 8 
Cook, Frederick A., claims of, 
to discovery of North Pole, 
198-201; member of Belgian 
expedition to Antarctic, 210- 
211 

Cook, James, voyages of, 203 
Cope, J. L., leader of Antarc¬ 
tic expedition, 275-277 
Copper, in Antarctic moun¬ 
tains, 277 

Coronation Gulf, reached by 
Hearne, 32 

Corte-Real, Gaspar, Portu¬ 
guese explorer, 4 
Crozier, Captain, member of 
Franklin expedition, 68 
David, Professor, member of 
Shackleton’s expedition, 254 
Davis, John, voyages of, 15-17 
Davis Strait, naming of, 15, 
17 

Dedrick, surgeon with Peary, 
185 

De Haven, Lieutenant, leader 
of Franklin relief expedi¬ 
tion, 72 

De Long, George W., Polar 
expedition of, 110-122; death 
of, 122 

Digges, Cape, named by Henry 
Hudson, 22 

Discovery, Scott’s South Polar 
expedition in the, 218-237 
Drygalski, Captain, command¬ 
er of German expedition to 
Antarctic, 211 

D’Urville, Dumont, French ex¬ 
plorer of Antarctic, 205-206 
Elizabeth, Queen, help given 
Frobisher by, 9 


Enderby Land, discovery of, 
205 

Erebus and Terror expedition 
to Antarctic (1840), 207-208 

Eric the Red, explorer of 
Greenland, 2 

Eskimos, friendly relations of 
John Davis with, 16; Nan¬ 
sen’s life with, 153 

Evans, Edgar, seaman with 
Scott in last expedition, 266- 
269; death of, 269 

Fraenkel, Knut, member of 
Andree expedition, 172 

Fram, Nansen’s vessel, 15S- 
170; Amundsen’s voyage in, 
to South Polar region, 262- 
264 

Franklin, Sir John, first Arc¬ 
tic voyage of, 34, 43; quoted 
on effects of cold in Arctic 
regions, 40; expedition of 
1819-21, 43-61; expedition of 
1845, 63; story of fate of, 

66- 69; results of expedition, 
69-70 

Franz Josef Land, discovery 
of, 142-143; Nansen’s adven¬ 
tures on, 166-168 

Frederick, heroic member of 
Greely expedition, 133-140 
“Friendly Arctic,” Stefans- 
son’s, 283-284 

Frobisher, Martin, voyages by, 
in search of Northwest Pas¬ 
sage, 8-15 

Frobisher Bay, discovery of, 
10 

Gerlache, Captain de, com¬ 
mander of Belgian expedi¬ 
tion to Antarctic, 209-211 

Gjoa, Amundsen’s vessel, 178 

Gold, early voyages in search 
of, 10; in Antarctic region, 
277 

Gore, Graham, lieutenant 
with Franklin expedition, 

67- 68 


INDEX 


295 


Greely, Adolphus W., Polar 
expedition of, 124-141 
Greenland, exploration of, by 
Eric the Red, 2; Portuguese 
expedition to, 4; mistaken 
for Finland by Frobisher, 
9; experiences of Captain 
Hall in, 91-96; Nansen’s 
journey over ice-plateau of, 
153; recent studies of, by 
Danish explorers, 281 
Grinnell, Henry, promoter of 
Dr. Kane’s expedition, 84 
GrTnnell Land, naming of, 84 

Hall, Charles Francis, Polar 
expedition of, 89 i -100; death 
of, 100 

Hayes, Isaac, surgeon with 
Kane’s expedition, 75, 76, 
77; leader of Arctic expedi¬ 
tion, 88-89 

Hearne, Samuel, search on 
foot by, for Northwest Pas¬ 
sage, 29-33 

Henrietta Island, discovery 
of, 112 

Henry VII. of England, patron 
of the Cabots, 3-4 
Henry VIII. of England, ex¬ 
ploring expeditions spon¬ 
sored by, 5 

Hensen, with Peary at dis¬ 
covery of North Pole, 196 
Hepburn, seaman with Frank¬ 
lin expedition, 44 
Hood, quoted on mosquitoes 
in Arctic regions, 41-42 
Hood’s River, naming of, 53 
Hooker, Joseph, scientist with 
Erebus and Terror expedi¬ 
tion, 208 

Hudson, Henry, 18; first voy¬ 
age of, 19; succeeding voy¬ 
ages and adventures, 19-26; 
fate of, 26-27 

Hudson River, discovery of, 
by Henry Hudson, 19 
Hudson’s Bay, discovery of, 
19 


Icebergs, Hudson’s experi¬ 
ences with, 20 

India, first suggestion of pas¬ 
sage to, 5; search for routes 
to, 8-33 

Insect pests in Arctic regions, 
41-42 

Jackson, F. G., Arctic explora¬ 
tions of, 145-149; meeting 
with Nansen, 168 

Jackson-Harmsworth Expedi¬ 
tion, 145-149 

Jeannette expedition, De 
Long’s, 110-123 

Jeannette Island, discovery 
of, 112 

Johansen, F. H„ Nansen’s 
lieutenant, 146, 161-170 

Kaiser William II. Land, dis¬ 
covery of, 211 

Kane, Elisha K., explorations 
and experiences Qf, 71-87 

Kara Strait, discovery of, 7 

Karluk, Stefansson’s vessel, 
284 

King Edward VII. Land, dis¬ 
covery of, 219 

Koch, Lange, Danish explorer 
of Greenland, 281 

Labrador, possible discovery 
of, by the Cabots, 3; reached 
by John Davis, 16; parts of, 
explored by Hudson, 20 

Lead, in South Polar region, 
277 

Lockwood, Lieutenant, mem¬ 
ber of Greely expedition, 
125 

Longstaff, Mt., Antarctic peak, 
230-231 

McClintock, Captain, com¬ 
mander of Franklin relief 
expedition, 65-66 

McClintock Channel, explored 
by Storkerson, 287 

MacMillan, Donald B., ex¬ 
ploration of Baffin Land by, 
281-282 


296 


INDEX 


Markham, Mt., Antarctic 
peak, 230-231 

Marshall, Dr., with Shackle- 
ton’s expedition, 241, 247, 
253, 254 

Marvin, Ross G., scientist 
with Peary, 197 

Melville, Chief Engineer in 
Jeannette expedition, 117- 
123 

Minerals in South Polar re¬ 
gions, 277 

Mosquitoes, a pest in Arctic 
regions, 41-42 

Muscovy Company, patent is¬ 
sued to Frobisher by, 9 

Nansen, Fridtjof, meeting of 
Jackson and, in Franz Josef 
Land, 146-147, 168; account 
of explorations of, 152-170 

Nares, George, commander of 
Challenger expedition, 209 

Newfoundland, sighted by 
the Cabots, 3 

Nimrod, Shackleton’s vessel, 
238 

Nordenskiold, A. E., Swedish 
explorer and discoverer of 
Northeast Passage, 149-151 

Nordenskiold, Otto, leader of 
Antarctic expedition, 211 

Northeast Passage, discovery 
of, 149-151 

North Pole, arrival of Peary 
at, 196 

Northwest Passage, search 
for, by Frobisher, 8-15; at¬ 
tempt to find, made by John 
Davis, 15-17; voyage of 
William Baffin, 17-18; Henry 
Hudson’s voyages^ 19-27; 
Hearne’8 overland search 
for, 29-33; voyagers of early 
years of 19th century, 34- 
42; first navigated by 
Amundsen, 178-180 

Novaya Zemlya, Chancellor’s 
voyage to, 7 


Oates, Captain L. E. G., with 
Scott in last expedition, 
266-269; death of, 269 

Othar, early Norwegian ex¬ 
plorer, 1-2 

Parry, W. E., voyages of, 34- 
35; sledge expedition of, 36- 
39 

Pavy, Dr., surgeon of Greely 
expedition, 125-128, 135 

Payer and Weyprecht, expedi¬ 
tion of, 142-143; discovery 
of Franz Josef Land by, 
143; return journey of, 144- 
145 

Peary, Robert E., 38; early 
Arctic explorations of, 181- 
183; seventh voyage, in 
1898, 183-185; expedition of 
1905-06, 191; final and suc¬ 
cessful voyage, 192-197; ar¬ 
rival at the Pole, 196; con¬ 
troversy with Dr. Cook, 198- 
201 

Penny, Captain, Grinnell 
Land named Albert Land 
by, 84; Peter I. Island, dis¬ 
covery of, 204 

Polaris, Captain Hall’s vessel, 
90-109 

Polar Star, Duke of Abruzzi’s 
vessel, 173-174 

Ponies, used in Polar explora¬ 
tion by Shackleton, 240 

Portuguese, exploring expedi¬ 
tions of, 4-5 

Pourquois Pas? Dr. Charcot’s 
vessel, 257 

Queen Elizabeth’s Foreland, 
named by Frobisher, 10 

Querios, commander of early 
South Polar expedition, 203 

Quest, Shackleton’s ship on 
last voyage, 274 

Rae, Dr. John, traces of 
Franklin expedition found' 
by, 64-65 


INDEX 


297 


Rasmussen, Knud, Danish ex¬ 
plorer of Greenland (1919), 
281 

Repulse Bay, Parry in, 35 
Repulse Harbor, named by 
Captain Hall, 96 
Richardson, Dr., scientist 
with Franklin expedition, 
44, 57-59 

Rogers, Captain B. M., with 
Captain Hall in Greenland, 
95 

Roosevelt, Peary’s vessel, 185, 
192, 193, 194 

Ross, James Clark, Antarctic 
explorer, 207-208 
Ross, Sir John, Arctic voy¬ 
ager, 34-35, 63 

St. Elias, Mt., ascent of, by 
Duke of Abruzzi, 174 
Schley, Captain W. S., rescuer 
of Greely party, 141 
Scoresby, Captain, Arctic voy¬ 
ager, 34; cited on effects of 
cold in Arctic regions, 39 
Scotia, South Polar voyage of 
the, 215-217 

Scott, Captain R. F., quoted 
on Captain Cook, 203; first 
South Polar expedition of, 
in the Discovery, 218-237; 
expedition of 1910, in ship 
Terra Nova, 259-262, 266- 
272; death of, 272 
Scurvy, dangerous disease, 40 
Shackleton, Ernest, a lieuten¬ 
ant in Scott’s expedition in 
the Discovery, 226-228; ex¬ 
pedition led by (1907-09), 
238-256; last voyage and 
death of (1921), 274-275 
Silver, in Antarctic, 277 
Sledges, first used by Parry, 
36-38; use of, by Scott in 
Antarctic exploration, 220- 
237; used by Shackleton, 
238-256; motor, used by 
Scott, 261 

Smith, B. Leigh, Arctic explor¬ 
ations of, 145 


Smith, William, discoverer of 
South Shetlands, 204 
Southern Gross, vessel used 
in Antarctic expedition of 
1898, 209 

South Pole, beginnings of ex¬ 
ploration in region of, 202- 
212; voyage of the Scotia, 
215-217; Scott’s expedition 
in the Discovery, 218-237; 
Shackleton’s explorations, 
238-256; French expedition 
led by Charcot, 257-259; 
Amundsen’s expedition to 
and arrival at, 262-264; 
Scott’s arrival at, 267-268; 
recent voyagers to region, 
274-277 

South Shetland Islands, dis¬ 
covery of, 204 

Stefansson, Vilhjalmur, Brit¬ 
ish flag hoisted over Wran¬ 
gell Island by, 283; scien¬ 
tific work and explorations 
of, in Arctic regions, 283- 
288; plans for new Arctic 
expedition, 288-289 
Storkerson, S. T., Stefans- 
son's lieutenant, 287 
Strindberg, Nils, member of 
Andree expedition, 172 
Sverdrup, Captain, member 
of Nansen’s expedition, 160, 
169 

Terra Australis Incognita, 
South Polar region called, 
203 

Terra Nova, Scott’s second! 
vessel, 259; used in Cope’s 
expedition, 275 
Thomsen, Charles, member of 
Stefansson expedition, 288 
Thorne, Robert, passage to 
India first suggested by, 5 

Vega, Nordenskiold’s vessel 
in voyage through North¬ 
east Passage, 150 


298 


INDEX 


Victoria Land, discovered by 
Captain Ross, 208 

Weddell, English sea-captain 
and discoverer, 204-205 
Wellman, Walter, Polar ex¬ 
peditions of, 175-177 
Wilkes, Commodore, Antarc¬ 
tic explorer, 206-207 
Wilkes Land, discovery of, 207 


Willoughby, Sir Hugh, early 
explorer, 5-6 

Wilson, Dr. E. A., with Scott 
in last expedition, 266-272 

Wrangell Island, claimed for 
Great Britain by Stefans- 
son, 283 

i 

Yugor Strait, Nansen’s voy¬ 
age through, 154 









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